Podcasts about brexiteers

We are joined by Mark Johnson, Conservative ouncillor for Shirley North in Croydon and Brexiteer. We reminisce about the 2016 Referedndum campaign and discuss his experiences as a Croydon councillor.Get in touch:Twitter: @CroydonConst Email: contact@croydonconstitutionalists.ukFacebook: facebook/CroydonConstitutionalistshttp://croydonconstitutionalists.uk/

It's official. The American Dream is dead. And it's been resurrected in Europe where, according to the FT columnist Simon Kuper, disillusioned Americans should relocate. Compared with the United States, Kuper argues, Europe offers the three key metrics of a 21st century good life: “four years more longevity, higher self-reported happiness and less than half the carbon emissions per person”. So where exactly to move? The Paris based Kuper believes that his city is the most beautiful in Europe. He's also partial to Madrid, which offers Europe's sunniest lifestyle. And even London, in spite of all its post Brexit gloom, Kuper promises, offers American exiles the promise of a better life than the miserable existence which they now have to eek out in the United States. Five Takeaways* Quality of Life.:Kuper believes European quality of life surpasses America's for the average person, with Europeans living longer, having better physical health, and experiencing less extreme political polarization.* Democratic Europe vs Aristocratic America: While the wealthy can achieve greater fortunes in America, Kuper argues that Europeans in the "bottom 99%" live longer and healthier lives than their American counterparts.* Guns, Anxiety and the Threat of Violence: Political polarization in America creates more anxiety than in Europe, partly because Americans might be armed and because religion makes people hold their views more fervently.* MAGA Madness: Kuper sees Trump as more extreme than European right-wing leaders like Italy's Meloni, who governs as "relatively pro-European" and "pro-Ukrainian."* It's not just a Trump thing. Kuper believes America's declining international credibility will persist even after Trump leaves office, as Europeans will fear another "America First" president could follow any moderate administration.Full TranscriptAndrew Keen: Hello everybody. It's Monday, April the 21st, 2025. This conversation actually might go out tomorrow on the 22nd. Nonetheless, the headlines of the Financial Times, the world's most global economic newspaper, are miserable from an American point of view. US stocks and the dollar are sinking again as Donald Trump renews his attack on the Fed chair Jay Powell. Meanwhile Trump is also attacking the universities and many other bastions of civilization at least according to the FT's political columnist Gideon Rachman. For another FT journalist, my guest today Simon Kuper has been on the show many times before. All this bad news about America suggests that for Americans it's time to move to Europe. Simon is joining us from Paris, which Paris is that in Europe Simon?Simon Kuper: I was walking around today and thinking it has probably never in its history looked as good as it does now. It really is a fabulous city, especially when the sun shines.Andrew Keen: Nice of them where I am in San Francisco.Simon Kuper: I always used to like San Francisco, but I knew it before every house costs $15 million.Andrew Keen: Well, I'm not sure that's entirely true, but maybe there's some truth. Paris isn't exactly cheap either, is it? Certainly where you live.Simon Kuper: Cheaper than San Francisco, so I did for this article that you mentioned, I did some research on house prices and certainly central Paris is one of the most expensive areas in the European Union, but still considerably cheaper than cities like New York and San Francisco. A friend of mine who lives here told me that if she moved to New York, she would move from central Paris to for the same price living in some very, very distant suburb of New York City.Andrew Keen: Your column this week, Americans, it's time to move to Europe. You obviously wrote with a degree of relish. Is this Europe's revenge on America that it's now time to reverse the brain drain from Europe to America? Now it's from America to Europe.Simon Kuper: I mean, I don't see it as revenge. I'm a generally pro-American person by inclination and I even married an American and have children who are American as well as being French and British. So when I went to the US as firstly as a child, age 10, 11, I was in sixth grade in California. I thought it was the most advanced, wonderful place in the world and the sunshine and there was nowhere nice than California. And then I went as a student in my early 20s. And again, I thought this was the early 90s. This is the country of the future. It's so much more advanced than Europe. And they have this new kind of wise technocratic government that is going to make things even better. And it was the beginning of a big American boom of the 90s when I think American quality of life reached its peak, that life expectancy was reached, that was then declined a long time after the late 90s. So my impressions in the past were always extremely good, but no longer. The last 20 years visiting the US I've never really felt this is a society where ordinary people can have as good a life as in Europe.Andrew Keen: When you say ordinary people, I mean, you're not an ordinary person. And I'm guessing most of the people you and your wife certainly isn't ordinary. She's a well known writer. In fact, she's written on France and the United States and parenthood, very well known, you are well known. What do you mean by ordinary people?Simon Kuper: Yeah, I mean, it's not entirely about me. Amazingly, I am not so egomaniac as to draw conclusions on some matters just looking at my own situation. What I wrote about the US is that if you're in the 1% in the US and you are pursuing great wealth in finance or tech and you have a genuine shot at it, you will achieve wealth that you can't really achieve in Europe. You know, the top end of the US is much higher than in Europe. Still not necessarily true that your life will be better. So even rich Americans live shorter than rich Europeans. But OK, so the 1% America really offers greater expansion opportunities than Europe does. Anywhere below that, the Europeans in the bottom 99%, let's say, they live longer than their American equivalents. They are less fat, their bodies function better because they walk more, because they're not being bombarded by processed food in the same way. Although we have political polarization here, it's not as extreme as in the US. Where I quote a European friend of mine who lives in the American South. He says he sometimes doesn't go out of his house for days at a time because he says meeting Trump supporters makes him quite anxious.Andrew Keen: Where does he live? I saw that paragraph in the piece, you said he doesn't, and I'm quoting him, a European friend of mine who lives in the American South sometimes doesn't leave his house for days on end so as to avoid running into Trump supporters. Where does he live?Simon Kuper: He lives, let me say he lives in Georgia, he lives in the state of Georgia.Andrew Keen: Well, is that Atlanta? I mean, Atlanta is a large town, lots of anti-Trump sentiment there. Whereabouts in Georgia?Simon Kuper: He doesn't live in Atlanta, but I also don't want to specify exactly where he lives because he's entitled.Andrew Keen: In case you get started, but in all seriousness, Simon, isn't this a bit exaggerated? I mean, I'm sure there are some of your friends in Paris don't go outside the fancy center because they might run into fans of Marine Le Pen. What's the difference?Simon Kuper: I think that polarization creates more anxiety in the US and is more strongly felt for a couple of reasons. One is that because people might be armed in America, that gives an edge to any kind of disagreement that isn't here in Europe. And secondly, because religion is more of a factor in American life, people hold their views more strongly, more fervently, then. So I think there's a seriousness and edge to the American polarization that isn't quite the same as here. And the third reason I think polarization is worse is movement is more extreme even than European far-right movements. So my colleague John Byrne Murdoch at the Financial Times has mapped this, that Republican views from issues from climate to the role of the state are really off the charts. There's no European party coeval to them. So for example, the far-right party in France, the Rassemblement National, doesn't deny climate change in the way that Trump does.Andrew Keen: So, how does that contextualize Le Pen or Maloney or even the Hungarian neo-authoritarians for whom a lot of Trump supporters went to Budapest to learn what he did in order to implement Trump 2.0?Simon Kuper: Yeah, I think Orban, in terms of his creating an authoritarian society where the universities have been reined in, where the courts have been rained in, in that sense is a model for Trump. His friendliness with Putin is more of a model for Trump. Meloni and Le Pen, although I do not support them in any way, are not quite there. And so Meloni in Italy is in a coalition and is governing as somebody relatively pro-European. She's pro-Ukrainian, she's pro-NATO. So although, you know, she and Trump seem to have a good relationship, she is nowhere near as extreme as Trump. And you don't see anyone in Europe who's proposing these kinds of tariffs that Trump has. So I think that the, I would call it the craziness or the extremism of MAGA, doesn't really have comparisons. I mean, Orban, because he leads a small country, he has to be a bit more savvy and aware of what, for example, Brussels will wear. So he pushes Brussels, but he also needs money from Brussels. So, he reigns himself in, whereas with Trump, it's hard to see much restraint operating.Andrew Keen: I wonder if you're leading American liberals on a little bit, Simon. You suggested it's time to come to Europe, but Americans in particular aren't welcome, so to speak, with open arms, certainly from where you're talking from in Paris. And I know a lot of Americans who have come to Europe, London, Paris, elsewhere, and really struggled to make friends. Would, for Americans who are seriously thinking of leaving Trump's America, what kind of welcome are they gonna get in Europe?Simon Kuper: I mean, it's true that I haven't seen anti-Americanism as strong as this in my, probably in my lifetime. It might have been like this during the Vietnam War, but I was a child, I don't remember. So there is enormous antipathy to, let's say, to Trumpism. So two, I had two visiting Irish people, I had lunch with them on Friday, who both work in the US, and they said, somebody shouted at them on the street, Americans go home. Which I'd never heard, honestly, in Paris. And they shouted back, we're not American, which is a defense that doesn't work if you are American. So that is not nice. But my sense of Americans who live here is that the presumption of French people is always that if you're an American who lives here, you're not a Trumpist. Just like 20 years ago, if you are an American lives here you're not a supporter of George W. Bush. So there is a great amount of awareness that there are Americans and Americans that actually the most critical response I heard to my article was from Europeans. So I got a lot of Americans saying, yeah, yeah. I agree. I want to get out of here. I heard quite a lot of Europeans say, for God's sake, don't encourage them all to come here because they'll drive up prices and so on, which you can already see elements of, and particularly in Barcelona or in Venice, basically almost nobody lives in Venice except which Americans now, but in Barcelona where.Andrew Keen: Only rich Americans in Venice, no other rich people.Simon Kuper: It has a particular appeal to no Russians. No, no one from the gulf. There must be some there must be something. They're not many Venetians.Andrew Keen: What about the historical context, Simon? In all seriousness, you know, Americans have, of course, fled the United States in the past. One thinks of James Baldwin fleeing the Jim Crow South. Could the Americans now who were leaving the universities, Tim Schneider, for example, has already fled to Canada, as Jason Stanley has as well, another scholar of fascism. Is there stuff that American intellectuals, liberals, academics can bring to Europe that you guys currently don't have? Or are intellectuals coming to Europe from the US? Is it really like shipping coal, so to speak, to Newcastle?Simon Kuper: We need them desperately. I mean, as you know, since 1933, there has been a brain drain of the best European intellectuals in enormous numbers to the United States. So in 1933, the best university system in the world was Germany. If you measure by number of Nobel prizes, one that's demolished in a month, a lot of those people end up years later, especially in the US. And so you get the new school in New York is a center. And people like Adorno end up, I think, in Los Angeles, which must be very confusing. And American universities, you get the American combination. The USP, what's it called, the unique selling point, is you have size, you have wealth, you have freedom of inquiry, which China doesn't have, and you have immigration. So you bring in the best brains. And so Europe lost its intellectuals. You have very wealthy universities, partly because of the role of donors in America. So, you know, if you're a professor at Stanford or Columbia, I think the average salary is somewhere over $300,000 for professors at the top universities. In Europe, there's nothing like that. Those people would at least have to halve their salary. And so, yeah, for Europeans, this is a unique opportunity to get some of the world's leading brains back. At cut price because they would have to take a big salary cut, but many of them are desperate to do it. I mean, if your lab has been defunded by the government, or if the government doesn't believe in your research into climate or vaccines, or just if you're in the humanities and the government is very hostile to it, or, if you write on the history of race. And that is illegal now in some southern states where I think teaching they call it structural racism or there's this American phrase about racism that is now banned in some states that the government won't fund it, then you think, well, I'll take that pay cost and go back to Europe. Because I'm talking going back, I think the first people to take the offer are going to be the many, many top Europeans who work at American universities.Andrew Keen: You mentioned at the end of Europe essay, the end of the American dream. You're quoting Trump, of course, ironically. But the essay is also about the end of the America dream, perhaps the rebirth or initial birth of the European dream. To what extent is the American dream, in your view, and you touched on this earlier, Simon, dependent on the great minds of Europe coming to America, particularly during and after the, as a response to the rise of Nazism, Hannah Arendt, for example, even people like Aldous Huxley, who came to Hollywood in the 1930s. Do you think that the American dream itself is in part dependent on European intellectuals like Arendt and Huxley, even Ayn Rand, who not necessarily the most popular figure on the left, but certainly very influential in her ideas about capitalism and freedom, who came of course from Russia.Simon Kuper: I mean, I think the average American wouldn't care if Ayn Rand or Hannah Arendt had gone to Australia instead. That's not their dream. I think their American dream has always been about the idea of social mobility and building a wealthy life for yourself and your family from nothing. Now almost all studies of social ability say that it's now very low in the US. It's lower than in most of Europe. Especially Northern Europe and Scandinavia have great social mobility. So if you're born in the lower, say, 10% or 20% in Denmark, you have a much better chance of rising to the top of society than if you were born at the bottom 10%, 20% in the US. So America is not very good for social mobility anymore. I think that the brains that helped the American economy most were people working in different forms of tech research. And especially for the federal government. So the biggest funder of science in the last 80 years or so, I mean, the Manhattan Project and on has been the US federal government, biggest in the world. And the thing is you can't eat atom bombs, but what they also produce is research that becomes hugely transformative in civilian life and in civilian industries. So GPS or famously the internet come out of research that's done within the federal government with a kind of vague defense angle. And so I think those are the brains that have made America richer. And then of course, the number of immigrants who found companies, and you see this in tech, is much higher than the number percentage of native born Americans who do. And a famous example of that is Elon Musk.Andrew Keen: Yeah, and you were on the show just before Christmas in response to your piece about Musk, Thiel and the shadow of apartheid in South Africa. So I'm guessing you don't want the Musks and Thiels. They won't be welcome in Europe, will they?Simon Kuper: I don't think they want to go. I mean, if you want to create a tech company, you want very deep capital markets. You want venture capital firms that are happy to bet a few billion on you. And a very good place to do that, the best place in the world by far, is Silicon Valley. And so a French friend of mine said he was at a reception in San Francisco, surrounded by many, many top French engineers who all work for Silicon Valley firms, and he thought, what would it take them to come back? He didn't have an answer. Now the answer might be, maybe, well, Donald Trump could persuade them to leave. But they want to keep issuing visas for those kinds of people. I mean, the thing is that what we're seeing with Chinese AI breakthroughs in what was called DeepSeek. Also in overtaking Tesla on electric cars suggests that maybe, you know, the cutting edge of innovation is moving from Silicon Valley after nearly 100 years to China. This is not my field of expertise at all. But you know the French economist Thomas Filippon has written about how the American economy has become quite undynamic because it's been taken over by monopolies. So you can't start another Google, you can start another Amazon. And you can't build a rival to Facebook because these companies control of the market and as Facebook did with WhatsApp or Instagram, they'll just buy you up. And so you get quite a much more static tech scene than 30 years ago when really, you know, inventions, great inventions are being made in Silicon Valley all the time. Now you get a few big companies that are the same for a very long period.Andrew Keen: Well, of course, you also have OpenAI, which is a startup, but that's another conversation.Simon Kuper: Yeah, the arguments in AI is that maybe China can do it better.Andrew Keen: Can be. I don't know. Well, it has, so to speak, Simon, the light bulb gone off in Europe on all this on all these issues. Mario Draghi month or two ago came out. Was it a white paper or report suggesting that Europe needed to get its innovation act together that there wasn't enough investment or capital? Are senior people within the EU like Draghi waking up to the reality of this historical opportunity to seize back economic power, not just cultural and political.Simon Kuper: I mean, Draghi doesn't have a post anymore, as far as I'm aware. I mean of course he was the brilliant governor of the European Central Bank. But that report did have a big impact, didn't it? It had a big impact. I think a lot of people thought, yeah, this is all true. We should spend enormous fortunes and borrow enormous fortunes to create a massive tech scene and build our own defense industries and so on. But they're not going to do it. It's the kind of report that you write when you don't have a position of power and you say, this is what we should do. And the people in positions of power say, oh, but it's really complicated to do it. So they don't do it, so no, they're very, there's not really, we've been massively overtaken and left behind on tech by the US and China. And there doesn't seem to be any impetus, serious impetus to build anything on that scale to invest that kind of money government led or private sector led in European tech scene. So yeah, if you're in tech. Maybe you should be going to Shanghai, but you probably should not be going to Europe. So, and this is a problem because China and the US make our future and we use their cloud servers. You know, we could build a search engine, but we can't liberate ourselves from the cloud service. Defense is a different matter where, you know, Draghi said we should become independent. And because Trump is now European governments believe Trump is hostile to us on defense, hostile to Ukraine and more broadly to Europe, there I think will be a very quick move to build a much bigger European defense sector so we don't have to buy for example American planes which they where they can switch off the operating systems if they feel like it.Andrew Keen: You live in Paris. You work for the FT, or one of the papers you work for is the FT a British paper. Where does Britain stand here? So many influential Brits, of course, went to America, particularly in the 20th century. Everyone from Alfred Hitchcock to Christopher Hitchens, all adding enormous value like Arendt and Ayn Rand. Is Britain, when you talk of Europe, are you still in the back of your mind thinking of Britain, or is it? An island somehow floating or stuck between America, the end of the American dream and the beginning of the European dream. In a way, are you suggesting that Brits should come to Europe as well?Simon Kuper: I think Britain is floating quite rapidly towards Europe because in a world where you have three military superpowers that are quite predatory and are not interested in alliances, the US, China and Russia, the smaller countries, and Britain is a smaller country and has realized since Brexit that it is a small country, the small countries just need to ally. And, you know, are you going to trust an alliance with Trump? A man who is not interested in the fates of other countries and breaks his word, or would you rather have an alliance with the Europeans who share far more of your values? And I think the Labor government in the UK has quietly decided that, I know that it has decided that on economic issues, it's always going to prioritize aligning with Europe, for example, aligning food standards with Europe so that we can sell my food. They can sell us our food without any checks because we've accepted all their standards, not with the US. So in any choice between, you know, now there's talk of a potential US-UK trade deal, do we align our standards with the US. Or Europe? It's always going to be Europe first. And on defense, you have two European defense powers that are these middle powers, France and the UK. Without the UK, there isn't really a European defense alliance. And that is what is gonna be needed now because there's a big NATO summit in June, where I think it's going to become patently obvious to everyone, the US isn't really a member of NATO anymore. And so then you're gonna move towards a post US NATO. And if the UK is not in it, well, it looks very, very weak indeed. And if UK is alone, that's quite a scary position to be in in this world. So yeah, I see a UK that is not gonna rejoin the European Union anytime soon. But is more and more going to ally itself, is already aligning itself with Europe.Andrew Keen: As the worm turned, I mean, Trump has been in power 100 days, supposedly is limited to the next four years, although he's talking about running for a third term. Can America reverse itself in your view?Simon Kuper: I think it will be very hard whatever Trump does for other countries to trust him again. And I also think that after Trump goes, which as you say may not be in 2028, but after he goes and if you get say a Biden or Obama style president who flies to Europe and says it's all over, we're friends again. Now the Europeans are going to think. But you know, it's very, very likely that in four years time, you will be replaced by another America first of some kind. So we cannot build a long term alliance with the US. So for example, we cannot do long term deals to buy Americans weapons systems, because maybe there's a president that we like, but they'll be succeeded by a president who terrifies us quite likely. So, there is now, it seems to me, instability built in for the very long term into... America has a potential ally. It's you just can't rely on this anymore. Even should Trump go.Andrew Keen: You talk about Europe as one place, which, of course, geographically it is, but lots of observers have noted the existence, it goes without saying, of many Europe's, particularly the difference between Eastern and Western Europe.Simon Kuper: I've looked at that myself, yes.Andrew Keen: And you've probably written essays on this as well. Eastern Europe is Poland, perhaps, Czech Republic, even Hungary in an odd way. They're much more like the United States, much more interested perhaps in economic wealth than in the other metrics that you write about in your essay. Is there more than one Europe, Simon? And for Americans who are thinking of coming to Europe, should it be? Warsaw, Prague, Paris, Madrid.Simon Kuper: These are all great cities, so it depends what you like. I mean, I don't know if they're more individualistic societies. I would doubt that. All European countries, I think, could be described as social democracies. So there is a welfare state that provides people with health and education in a way that you don't quite have in the United States. And then the opposite, the taxes are higher. The opportunities to get extremely wealthy are lower here. I think the big difference is that there is a part of Europe for whom Russia is an existential threat. And that's especially Poland, the Baltics, Romania. And there's a part of Europe, France, Britain, Spain, for whom Russia is really quite a long way away. So they're not that bothered about it. They're not interested in spending a lot on defense or sending troops potentially to die there because they see Russia as not their problem. I would see that as a big divide. In terms of wealth, I mean, it's equalizing. So the average Pole outside London is now, I think, as well off or better than the average Britain. So the average Pole is now as well as the average person outside London. London, of course, is still.Andrew Keen: This is the Poles in the UK or the Poles.Simon Kuper: The Poles in Poland. So the Poles who came to the UK 20 years ago did so because the UK was then much richer. That's now gone. And so a lot of Poles and even Romanians are returning because economic opportunities in Poland, especially, are just as good as in the West. So there has been a little bit of a growing together of the two halves of the continent. Where would you live? I mean, my personal experience, having spent a year in Madrid, it's the nicest city in the world. Right, it's good. Yeah, nice cities to live in, I like living in big cities, so of big cities it's the best. Spanish quality of life. If you earn more than the average Spaniard, I think the average income, including everyone wage earners, pensioners, students, is only about $20,000. So Spaniards have a problem with not having enough income. So if you're over about $20000, and in Madrid probably quite a bit more than that, then it's a wonderful life. And I think, and Spaniards live about five years longer than Americans now. They live to about age 84. It's a lovely climate, lovely people. So that would be my personal top recommendation. But if you like a great city, Paris is the greatest city in the European Union. London's a great, you know, it's kind of bustling. These are the two bustling world cities of Europe, London and Paris. I think if you can earn an American salary, maybe through working remotely and live in the Mediterranean somewhere, you have the best deal in the world because Mediterranean prices are low, Mediterranean culture, life is unbeatable. So that would be my general recommendation.Andrew Keen: Finally, Simon, being very generous with your time, I'm sure you'd much rather be outside in Paris in what you call the greatest city in the EU. You talk in the piece about three metrics that show that it's time to move to Europe, housing, education, sorry, longevity, happiness and the environment. Are there any metrics at all now to stay in the United States?Simon Kuper: I mean, if you look at people's incomes in the US they're considerably higher, of course, your purchasing power for a lot of things is less. So I think the big purchasing power advantage Americans have until the tariffs was consumer goods. So if you want to buy a great television set, it's better to do that out of an American income than out of a Spanish income, but if you want the purchasing power to send your kids to university, to get healthcare. Than to be guaranteed a decent pension, then Europe is a better place. So even though you're earning more money in the US, you can't buy a lot of stuff. If you wanna go to a nice restaurant and have a good meal, the value for money will be better in Europe. So I suppose if you wanna be extremely wealthy and you have a good shot at that because a lot people overestimate their chance of great wealth. Then America is a better bet than Europe. Beyond that, I find it hard to right now adduce reasons. I mean, it's odd because like the Brexiteers in the UK, Trump is attacking some of the things that really did make America great, such as this trading system that you can get very, very cheap goods in the United States, but also the great universities. So. I would have been much more positive about the idea of America a year ago, but even then I would've said the average person lives better over here.Andrew Keen: Well, there you have it. Simon Cooper says to Americans, it's time to move to Europe. The American dream has ended, perhaps the beginning of the European dream. Very provocative. Simon, we'll get you back on the show. Your column is always a central reading in the Financial Times. Thanks so much and enjoy Paris.Simon Kuper: Thank you, Andrew. Enjoy San Francisco. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit keenon.substack.com/subscribe

Do Trump's tariffs prove Brexiteers right?Plus, journalist Ash Sarkar takes your calls on her new book.

They may have both been leading Brexiteers but Dominic Cummings and Nigel Farage were once fierce rivals, vying to be the top campaign of the referendum. As recently as last year Cummings accused Farage of ‘surrounding himself with useless characters' – so why are we now hearing of a secret meeting between the two before Christmas? Ed Balls and George Osborne pick apart the significance of this rendezvous at a time when Reform are contending with a senior bust up, as well as an imminent by-election in Runcorn where polling has them out in front. In a week where Diane Abbott and Andy Burnham backed Ed's criticisms of the government's welfare reform, Liz Kendall has been in the Commons to announce further detail of Labour's plan. And they reflect on what options Chancellor Rachel Reeves will have in her Spring Statement (or mini-budget) next week. Can she create a reset moment?Plus, in London this week was the new Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney. With rumours swirling about an imminent Canadian election, George and Ed debate the merits of calling a vote early into your premiership, reminiscing about the examples of Gordon Brown's ‘the election that never was' and Theresa May's disastrous loss of a majority in 2017. You could have been listening to this episode of EMQs early and ad-free with a Political Currency Gold subscription! And not only that… you could have been in the room asking a question as a member of Political Currency's KITCHEN CABINET, along with early and ad-free listening, and exclusive Political Currency merchSubscribe now: patreon.com/politicalcurrency or on Apple Podcasts: apple.co/politicalcurrency. Please note Kitchen Cabinet subscriptions are only available through Patreon.Technical Producer: Daniel PapeProducer: Miriam Hall and Jarek ŻabaExecutive Producers: Ellie Clifford Political Currency is a Persephonica Production and is part of the Acast Creator Network. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Subscribe now on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Alex Andreou and Naomi Smith welcome special guest More in Common's Luke Tryl to discuss the latest from Washington and how it is making life very difficult for right wing politicians in the UK, including Nigel Farage, suffering rejection-by-association. PLUS We take a deep dive into 'Blue Labour'. Is it genuine? Is it attractive? Is it coherent? Why is Steve Bannon and the Trump regime so interested in it? And of course 'Wokey Dokey' and 'Grin And Share It'. ***SPONSOR US AT KO-FI.COM/QUIETRIOTPOD*** ALEX ANDREOU'S PODYSSEY can be found here: APPLE: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/alex-andreous-podyssey/id1798575126 SPOTIFY: https://open.spotify.com/show/2x7cD3HjkOyOKTF4YT5Goy?si=e7a86b762431451f AMAZON MUSIC: https://music.amazon.co.uk/podcasts/8c996062-ef8d-42e4-9d80-5b407cb6e2e2/alex-andreou's-podyssey OVERCAST: https://overcast.fm/+ABN4Gd7AP9Q POCKET CASTS: https://pca.st/podcast/9e98d690-d812-013d-ea22-0affdfd67dbd YouTube Music: Coming Soon Or you can add it to any app, using the RSS feed: https://feeds.megaphone.fm/podyssey SUBSCRIBE OR FOLLOW NOW “Trump is such a gifted communicator that he constructs his own reality. The one bit he can't control, the one part of reality he cannot alter, is how much people's weekly supermarket bill is, or what they pay at the gas pump. And it might be his undoing.” “The notion of a European army used to be the Brexiteers' bogeyman. And now more people believe there should be such a combined European defence force than not. In fact, support for it has doubled since 2020. So, Trump has definitely had a cohesive effect.” “There is a danger at the moment of confusing the very online Reform supporters on X with wider Reform. Actually, if you look at the shift that's allowed them to grow eight-nine points since the election, they're more moderate, more female, and don't approve of Trump or Musk.” “The working class is not some homogenous block of post-liberal anti-woke Trumpists, just like not every progressive lives in leafy North London, supports Arsenal, and studied law at a Russell Group University. I reject this kind of identity politics.” “[Blue Labour] seems to me a sort of pretend salt-of-the-earth authenticity and radicalism, while actually just appropriating small-c conservative politics of division. Women and ethnic or sexual minorities are pretty absent from their cynically drawn picture of class.” “On immigration, the median voter balances three things: compassion, control, and competence. And politicians confuse that with ‘people don't want any immigration'. It's just not true.” CALLS TO ACTION LINKS: Find out more about 1 Team 1 Fight and donate to them. Find out more about joining The Fabian Society. Help the charity Marie Curie with their Great Daffodil Appeal. GRIN AND SHARE IT A new test for pancreatic cancer: https://bigthink.com/health/pancreatic-cancer-screen/  DNA discoveries about pancreatic cancer: https://www.theguardian.com/society/article/2024/jul/15/scientists-make-dna-discovery-that-could-help-find-pancreatic-cancer-cure  Latest study results: https://www.mskcc.org/news/can-mrna-vaccines-fight-pancreatic-cancer-msk-clinical-researchers-are-trying-find-out  Our bookshop featuring many of the books we have featured can be found at uk.bookshop.org/shop/quietriot. Kick your X habit, finally, by using one of three Quiet Riot Bluesky Starter Packs. With one click, it will hook you up with, among many good accounts, Alex, Naomi, and Kenny. ***SPONSOR US AT KO-FI.COM/QUIETRIOTPOD*** With Naomi Smith, Alex Andreou and Kenny Campbell – in cahoots with Sandstone Global. Email us at quietriotpod@gmail.com. Or visit our website www.quietriotpod.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Parliament passed a law requiring the Government to spend 0.7% of Gross National Income on international aid. So, should Ministers be able to bypass that legal obligation through a ministerial statement? We also discuss Labour MP Mike Amesbury's suspended jail sentence and how a recall petition will be called if he doesn't voluntarily step down. Plus, we explore the controversy surrounding the Product Safety and Metrology Bill, which Brexiteers warn could stealthily realign Britain with the EU while handing Ministers sweeping legislative powers.Should MPs have a say on the Government's decision to cut yet more from the UK's international aid budget to fund increased defence spending? By law, the UK is committed to spending 0.7% of Gross National Income (GNI) on international aid. Yet this latest reduction does not have to be put to a vote in Parliament. With aid spending now slashed to just 0.3% of GNI, could an upcoming Estimates Day debate on Foreign Office funding give MPs a chance to raise concerns about the decision? And with the aid budget shrinking, is it time to reconsider the role of the International Development Select Committee? Meanwhile, Labour MP Mike Amesbury has had his 10-week jail sentence for assault suspended on appeal — but that may not be enough to save his Commons seat. As Ruth explains, an MP sentenced to jail — even with a suspended sentence — faces a recall petition. If 10% of voters in Runcorn and Helsby back his removal, the Government will be forced into a by-election, unless he voluntarily resigns his seat first. Also in the spotlight: the Product Safety and Metrology Bill. Ministers are keen to reassure MPs about this seemingly technical legislation, but Brexiteers suspect it's a Trojan Horse for creeping EU alignment. The bill contains sweeping "Henry VIII powers," allowing ministers to rewrite laws with minimal parliamentary oversight. Ruth and Mark ponder why governments keep reaching for these controversial powers —and what it means for democracy.

De geopolitieke ontwikkelingen gaan sneller dan Europa aankan: na de schok van de veiligheidsconferentie in München, waar de fundering van de trans-Atlantische samenwerking ineens op losse schroeven werd gezet, is Amerika nu stappen aan het zetten met Rusland om een einde aan de oorlog in Oekraïne te bewerkstelligen. Een Europees antwoord is er nog niet. Na een eerste spoedoverleg op maandag vindt er ook vandaag weer in Parijs een bijeenkomst plaats. Lukt het de Europese landen een gezamenlijk plan te maken? Daarover hoogleraar oorlogsstudies aan de Universiteit Leiden en voormalig gevechtsvlieger Frans Osinga. (15:03) De Wit en de Brit #3: Hoe groot is de kloof in Verenigd Koninkrijk? Leveling up: het was hét stopwoordje van voormalig premier Boris Johnson rond de Brexit-periode. Het Verenigd Koninkrijk is één van de meest ongelijke landen in Europa. Maar als de Britten de EU verlieten, dan zou het geld dat eerst naar Brussel ging, gebruikt worden om de ongelijkheid in het land aan te pakken, zo stelden de Brexiteers. In aflevering 3 van De Wit en de Brit gaat Tim de Wit op zoek naar wat daarvan, vijf jaar na de Brexit, terecht is gekomen. Presentatie: Eva Koreman Volg ons op Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/vpro_bureaubuitenland/), Linkedin (https://www.linkedin.com/company/vpro-bureau-buitenland/), en Bluesky (https://bsky.app/profile/bureaubuitenland.bsky.social)

Het regeringsleger van Burhan staat op het punt de hoofdstad Khartoem weer terug in te nemen van de paramilitaire formatie RSF. Na bijna twee jaar zou dit een kantelpunt kunnen vormen in de bloedige strijd in het land. Er wordt al gesproken over een nieuwe regering; de vraag is wie daar onderdeel van zullen uitmaken. Daarover journalist Klaas van Dijken. (15:08) De Wit en de Brit: Falende gezondheidszorg  Vijf jaar na het vertrek van de Britten uit de Europese Unie keert Bureau Buitenland-presentator Tim de Wit terug naar zijn geliefde Verenigd Koninkrijk. In de serie De Wit en de Brit maakt hij de balans op: wat is er terechtgekomen van al die beloftes van de Brexiteers? Een van de meest gehoopte gevolgen van Brexit was meer geld voor de gezondheidszorg. Hoe groot zijn de verschillen tussen de NHS en privéklinieken? Hoe kijkt Boris Johnson naar de status van het zorgsysteem in het Verenigd Koninkrijk? Een verslag van Tim de Wit. Presentatie: Sophie Derkzen Volg ons op Instagram (https://www.instagram.com/vpro_bureaubuitenland/), Linkedin (https://www.linkedin.com/company/vpro-bureau-buitenland/), Bluesky (https://bsky.app/profile/bureaubuitenland.bsky.social). 

Vor fünf Jahren verließen die Briten die EU. Mittlerweile räumt sogar die Mehrheit der Brexiteers ein, dass das Experiment gescheitert ist. Und wer führt in den Umfragen? Nigel Farage, das politische Gesicht der Leave-Kampagne. »Take back control«, darum sollte es gehen. Mit dem Brexit wollte Großbritannien nicht nur aus der EU austreten, sondern man wollte wieder frei sein, wieder die Kontrolle über das eigene Land haben. Gerade in Fragen der Einwanderung. 52 Prozent der Wählerinnen und Wähler stimmten für den Austritt. Von diesen Wählern sind mittlerweile nur noch 11 Prozent davon überzeugt, dass es gut für das Land war. Umso überraschender ist, dass ausgerechnet der Politiker, der wie kein anderer für den Ausstieg kämpfte, jetzt wieder die Umfragen anführt.In dieser Folge von »Acht Milliarden« spricht Host Juan Moreno mit Steffen Lüdke, SPIEGEL-Korrespondent in London. Lüdke ist davon überzeugt, dass Farages Aufstieg vor allem etwas über einen anderen Mann sagt: den britischen Premier Keir Starmer. »Er führt eine historisch unbeliebte Regierung an, von der eine Mehrzahl der Briten glaubt 'Gut, mit dem wird es auch nicht besser'«, so Lüdke. Farage sei mal wieder der Nutznießer. +++ Alle Infos zu unseren Werbepartnern finden Sie hier. Die SPIEGEL-Gruppe ist nicht für den Inhalt dieser Seite verantwortlich. +++ Den SPIEGEL-WhatsApp-Kanal finden Sie hier. Alle SPIEGEL Podcasts finden Sie hier. Mehr Hintergründe zum Thema erhalten Sie mit SPIEGEL+. Entdecken Sie die digitale Welt des SPIEGEL, unter spiegel.de/abonnieren finden Sie das passende Angebot. Informationen zu unserer Datenschutzerklärung.

In Turkije klinkt steeds meer hoop op vrede met de Koerdische PKK, waarmee het land al decennialang verwikkeld is in gewapende strijd. De Turken hameren op een einde van het conflict en daar lijken de Koerden nu serieus gehoor aan te geven. Is er daadwerkelijke kans op vrede? En waarom juist nu? Daarover collega en Turkijekenner Cevahir Varan. (14:31) De Wit en de Brit #1: Migratie Vijf jaar na het vertrek van de Britten uit de Europese Unie keert Bureau Buitenland-presentator Tim de Wit terug naar zijn geliefde Verenigd Koninkrijk. In de serie De Wit en de Brit maakt hij de balans op: wat is er terecht gekomen van al die beloftes van de Brexiteers? In aflevering #1: migratie. Het was voor veel Britten dé belofte om vóór Brexit te stemmen: als het Verenigd Koninkrijk uit de Europese Unie zou stappen, zou het weer controle krijgen over de eigen grenzen en dus migratie drastisch naar beneden kunnen brengen. Maar is dat ook gebeurd? Een verslag van Tim de Wit. Presentatie: Sophie Derkzen Volg Bureau Buitenland op... –Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/vpro_bureaubuitenland/ –LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/93346725 –Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/bureaubuitenland.bsky.social

Triggernometry's Francis Foster joins me to look back at an eventful start to the big Trump sequel. From the Village People to accusations of Nazi salutes we deep dive on all things inauguration. Then we ask how the hell Keir Starmer gets in Trump's good books, while also scratching our heads at Brexiteers starting to sound like Remainers. Order the PAPERBACK EDITION of my book: https://www.amazon.co.uk/British-Bloke-Decoded-Everything-explained/dp/1800961308/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr= JOIN the Podcast Patreon and receive each episode early, AD-FREE & with bonus content https://www.patreon.com/geoffnorcott?fan_landing=true  Join my MAILING LIST for priority Tour booking & special offers https://signup.ymlp.com/xgyueuwbgmgb Watch my COMEDY SPECIAL on YouTube https://youtu.be/YaxhuZGtDLs  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Trump has won again as a disruptor, reflecting the mood of an impatient electorate aching for change. Starmer won the election last year arguing for ‘change' – but can he become a confident changemaker? And why are hardline Brexiteers so content with Trump's power to determine the fate of the British economy, while obsessing over Westminster sovereignty in relation to the EU? Rock & Roll Politics is live at Kings Place on the 3rd of February for the first live show in what will be a wild political year. Tickets here. Subscribe to Patreon for live events, bonus podcasts, and to get the regular podcast a day early and ad free.  Written and presented by Steve Richards. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Trump is impossible to forecast - so should we stop trying? Is talking about him merely enabling him? Colluding with him?There is a spiders-web of connections between Trump and Brexit.Farage, Le Pen and Orban have a new spring in their step.Brexiteers still hanker after a free trade deal with the US. They must confront the reality of a protectionist US President - and government.One way Trump could make mischief would be to implement his global tariffs but offer the UK an exemption. The British government could hardly say no. But that would blow out of the water all of their efforts 'to get closer to the EU'. That would be the end of the 'rebuilding trust' project.Brexit is now too difficult to talk about. It may even be a problem too difficult to solve. Most Britons agree that Brexit was a mistake but is now a problem child best kept hidden.Electorates everywhere want anything but the truth.A fabulous conversation with Professor Chris Grey Become a member at https://plus.acast.com/s/the-other-hand-with-jim.power-and-chris.johns. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It's a busy day in Westminster as we await the new Chancellor's ‘spending audit' of the financial challenges Labour has ‘discovered' on entering government. But in the meantime there has been some movement in the Tory leadership race, with the deadline for applicants later this afternoon. Kemi Badenoch is the latest to declare, whilst Suella Braverman – the onetime standard-bearer of the Brexiteer right – has penned a piece for Monday's Telegraph, declaring that she will not throw her hat in the ring. What's next for her?  Patrick Gibbons speaks to Katy Balls and James Heale.  Produced by Oscar Edmondson and Patrick Gibbons. 

On the eve of the 2024 General Election, we're tackling one of the UK's most divisive topics; Brexit.The 2016 referendum on EU membership split voters in two, creating two entrenched camps - Brexiteers and Remainers - whose differences show no signs of abating 8 years later. To better understand this political hot potato, we're charting Britain's relationship with the EU from the 1950s all the way up to the present day.Dan is joined by Tim Bale, Professor of Politics at Queen Mary University of London. Tim explains why Britain first pursued closer integration with Europe, and how various factors saw the Brexit movement eventually gain traction.Produced by Mariana Des Forges and James Hickmann, and edited by Dougal Patmore.Enjoy unlimited access to award-winning original documentaries that are released weekly and AD-FREE podcasts. Sign up HERE for 50% off for 3 months using code ‘DANSNOW'.We'd love to hear from you - what do you want to hear an episode on? You can email the podcast at ds.hh@historyhit.com.You can take part in our listener survey here.

Show Notes and Transcript Mike Yardley joins Hearts of Oak to discuss his varied background, including military service and journalism, addressing censorship in contemporary Britain, particularly concerning vaccines and lockdowns. We examine the impact of censorship on free speech, social media algorithms, and the consequences of opposing mainstream narratives.  The conversation delves into declining democracy, globalist agendas, and the suppression of individual liberties.  Mike highlights concerns about powerful entities controlling public discourse and a lack of open debate on critical issues.  We end on political changes in Europe and the necessity of open discussions to tackle societal issues, particularly the significance of critical thinking, diverse perspectives, and unrestricted dialogue to shape a better future. Mike Yardley is well known as a sporting journalist, shooting instructor, and hunter and has written and broadcast extensively on all aspects of guns and their use. His articles (2000+) have appeared in many journals as well as in the national press. He has appeared as an expert witness in cases which relate to firearms and firearms safety. He is a founding fellow of the Association of Professional Shooting Instructors, and has formal instructing qualifications from a variety of other bodies. He is listed one of The Field's ‘Top Shots.' He retired from the press competition at the CLA Game Fair after winning it three times. As well as his shooting activities he has written books on other subjects including an account of the independent Polish trade union Solidarity, a biography of T.E. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia), and a history of the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst itself. He is a contributing author and ‘Special Researcher' to the Oxford History of the British Army (in which he wrote the concluding chapter and essays on the army in Northern Ireland and the SAS). He is also a frequent broadcaster and has made and presented documentaries for the BBC. Mike has also been involved as a specialist ballistic consultant, and presenter, in many productions for various TV companies including the Discovery and History Channels. He has re-enacted on location worldwide the death of the Red Baron, the Trojan Horse incident from ancient history, and some of the most infamous assassinations, including those of JFK, RFK and Abe Lincoln. Michael has worked a photojournalist and war reporter in Syria, Lebanon, Albania/Kosovo, Africa, and Afghanistan. He was seized off the street in Beirut in 1982 (before Terry Waite and John McCarthy) but released shortly afterwards having befriended one of his captors. In 1986 he made 3 clandestine crossings into Afghanistan with the Mujahedin putting his cameras aside and working as a medic on one mission. In the late 1990s, he ran aid convoys to Kosovan Refugees in Albania and on the Albanian/Kosovo border. The charity he co-founded, ‘Just Help,' was honoured for this work which took 300 tons of relief to desperately needy people. Connect with Mike... X/TWITTER        twitter.com/YardleyShooting WEBSITE            positiveshooting.com Interview recorded 2.5.24 Connect with Hearts of Oak... X/TWITTER        x.com/HeartsofOakUK WEBSITE            heartsofoak.org/ PODCASTS        heartsofoak.podbean.com/ SOCIAL MEDIA  heartsofoak.org/connect/ SHOP                 heartsofoak.org/shop/ *Special thanks to Bosch Fawstin for recording our intro/outro on this podcast. Check out his art theboschfawstinstore.blogspot.com and follow him on X/Twitter twitter.com/TheBoschFawstin  (Hearts of Oak) Hello Hearts of Oak, thank you so much for joining us once again and I'm joined by someone who I've been enjoying watching on Twitter for the last couple of years and delighted that he can join us today and that's Mike Yardley. Mike, thank you so much for your time today. (Mike Yardley) Yeah, great to be here and thank you very much for asking me Peter. Not at all, thoroughly enjoyed. I thought I would But let our audience also enjoy your input. And we had a good chat on the phone the other week about all different issues. And people can find you @YardleyShooting, which introduces the question, Yardley Shooting. Maybe you want to give just a one or two minute introduction of your background. I know you've written. You have a deep passion and understanding of history, along with many other things. But maybe give the viewer just a little bit of your background. Well, I've had a wide and varied career. I studied psychology at university. I went to the army. Wasn't really, you know, content in the army. And I resigned my commission in 1980. But I was in the army at a very interesting time. Height of the Cold War. I was on what was then the West German and East German border watching the East Germans and Russians watching us. So an intriguing place. And I really left the army to become a war reporter, a photographer, particularly initially. And also I went to Poland. I was in Poland for the rise of solidarity. I brought an exhibition back to the UK, which opened at the National Theatre. And memorably with Peggy Ashcroft doing the honours at that event, and Sir John Gielgud as patron. And then I've sort of made my way as an author and as a freelance. And I've also had a parallel career as an arms specialist. I've written a, probably millions of words in that area, but I've also written the final chapter of the Oxford History of the British Army, essays within that, books on the history of Sandhurst and co-written with another ex-officer, a book about the army, lots of technical stuff, a number of technical books. And I'm very interested in mass communication. I have made in the deep and distant past, some documentaries for the BBC. I made one on the history of terrorism for the BBC World Service. I made another on the media and the monarchy for the BBC World Service. And I think they actually let me broadcast once on another subject I'm very interested in, which is doubt. So since then, I've made my living with my pen and my camera. I was in Lebanon in the the early 1980s, again, not a good place to be there. And I made several sneaky beaky trips into Afghanistan, not as a soldier, but as a journalist when the Russians were there. And that was a very interesting time too. And, you know, gave me some ideas that perhaps other people didn't have the advantage of that experience. So yeah, quite an interesting career. I'm still a columnist for one well-known field sports magazine, The Field. And I am still at it. I don't know how long I'm going to be at it for. But one of the interesting things, I suppose, for me has been the advent of social media. And I thought social media was going to give me a chance to see what other people were thinking. But as well as what other people were thinking, to give me a chance for unfettered expression. Because I think it would be fair to say that I do feel that you cannot really say what you think in modern Britain. It comes with all sorts of disadvantages. As you get older and maybe you don't need the income as much, then perhaps not as important. You know, you can harder to cancel you as you get older and you don't really care. But I do think that's an issue in modern Britain. I think since the whole advent of lockdown and all the propaganda that was associated with it, and indeed with the Ukraine war, although I'm a supporter of the Ukrainians, I was rather horrified by the extent of the propaganda campaign to get us involved, as I have been rather shocked by all the propaganda surrounding lockdown and COVID, et cetera. And one other key point of my background is that I got very badly injured after I had the vaccine. I collapsed the next day. I had the worst headache of my life. I was in bed for a month or six weeks. I got a thrombosis in my leg, tinnitus, all sorts of other shingles, all sorts of other horrible stuff. I couldn't really walk. And even as I speak to you now, I've got shingles. I've got this blessed tinnitus ringing in my head, which a lot of other people have had post-vaccination and constant headaches. So I just have to live with that now, which means that you're always having to go through that to talk to people and to get your point across. Well, I've got a feeling that we may have you on a number of times, Mike, because there's so much to unpack there. But maybe we can start with a comment you made on censorship. And certainly we've seen this over the last four years. I've noticed in different areas, but specifically since being in the media space, I think since 2020, I've certainly seen it, had seen a little bit back in my days with UKIP during the Brexit campaign also but we have the BBC in the UK I guess they are the gatekeepers of information or have been up until this point and I know they've just the BBC have just done a series on misinformation or extremism and they of someone they employ full-time to actually cover what they see as misinformation and that kind of re-galvanizes their position as gatekeepers. But what are your thoughts on censorship? And I guess where state media fit into that? Yeah, I've been listening to that BBC series, and there's quite a lot of BBC stuff in that area at the moment. I think the first thing I'd say is this. I used to be one of the main voices heard in the media talking about security and terrorism. I hardly ever broadcast now. I don't get the opportunity because I'm not on narrative. And I think that's often because I present a nuanced position. And that doesn't seem to be popular in the modern media. Is censorship a problem now? Yes, it is. It's a problem because I can't easily broadcast anymore, having spent many years broadcasting and making lots of stuff for all sorts of different programs, as well as making a few programs of my own. I can't do that anymore. I think I may have made half a dozen or seven Discovery shows as well, but the phone no longer rings. And I'm pretty sure it doesn't ring particularly because I took up a vaccine sceptical position. And this is where it starts to get, this is the stuff we should unpack because it's really interesting. I was just listening before we started broadcasting to a BBC program that was talking about Russian operations promoting the anti-vaccine position. Well, I get that. I can see that the Russians have been involved in that. And we can come back to my own Twitter account, where I see clearly that if I put up a comment that is in any way critical of the Russians, it gets no support at all. But it might get probably half a dozen or 10 times as much pro-Russian support. And I've been trying to work out what's going on with that. It's almost as if the Russians have some way of manipulating that particular platform. But on the other hand, coming back to this point about vaccine scepticism, it's not just the Russians who are promoting that. Maybe it was in their interest to do that. But there are people in the UK, myself included, who were genuinely injured by the vaccines and who want to talk about it and feel that their point of view has completely been suppressed by these big social media platforms and by the BBC. It is just a non-subject. They don't really talk about excess deaths. They don't talk about widespread vaccine injury. You hear occasionally about VITT thrombosis with young women who've had these terrible thrombosis in their brains, but you do not hear about quite widespread vaccine injury. Now, I put up a comment on Twitter, do you know of anyone who's had a vaccine injury? I had something like, well, I think two, it depends on how you count them, but something like two million views, but 6,000 replies, and listing a lot more than 6,000 injuries. Now, I'm sure you can't necessarily take that as absolute gospel, but it is indicative of the fact that many people think they have been damaged by the vaccines, but also they can't talk about it. Their doctors aren't interested in it. The BBC don't seem to be interested in it. What in a free country are we meant to do? Well, we do this. We try and get our message out by other means, but it shouldn't be like that. And this seems to be a trend, this big state authoritarianism with a much more controlled media, which is facilitated by all the digitization that's going on. That is a real issue in modern Britain? Certainly, we came across that with YouTube putting videos up, and you daren't put a video up on YouTube critiquing the vaccine narrative or the COVID narrative. But recently, there has been some change. I know that there is legal action against AstraZeneca. I think in the last two days, there have been reports of AstraZeneca admitting that it did in in a tiny amount of cases but they haven't mentioned this before there were side effects. It does seem as though either it's the chipping away of those who've been vaccine injured demanding a voice, either it's been MPs becoming a little bit more vocal, obviously Andrew Bridgen, or it's been maybe a change in Twitter and the information out. I mean how do you see that because it does seem as though the message is slowly getting out? Well, Facebook's interesting because they've changed their policy, obviously, because before I couldn't say anything, it had come up with a note. And I have in the past had blocks from both Facebook and from Twitter. And I've also had apologies from both. I've done my best, because I don't think I ever say anything that is inappropriate or improper. That still doesn't prevent you being censored today. But twice, once with Facebook and once with Twitter, I've managed to get an apology out of them and been reinstated. So this is very disturbing stuff. And we're talking about this small number of injuries that are being acknowledged are about these brain thrombosis, the VITT thrombosis, which is an extremely rare condition, to quote an Oxford medic friend of mine. You know, rare as hen's teeth, hardly affects anyone. But it seems that thrombosis more generally, DVT and pulmonary embolism, and other things like myocarditis are comparatively common, and the re-ignition of possibly dormant cancers, which Professor Angus Dalgleish has been talking about at great length. And these are subjects which should be debated freely. I mean, when you see Andrew Bridgen in the House of Commons talking about excess deaths and he's almost talking to an empty Commons chamber. Albeit you can hear some fairly vociferous shouting coming from or cheering coming from the gallery, which the Speaker or the Assistant Speaker tried to close down, but that is a bit worrying. What has happened to British democracy? What has happened to our birth right of free speech? I mean, it isn't what it used to be. In fact, not only is it not what it used to be, on many subjects, we are not free to speak anymore. Not just the ones I discussed, there are all sorts of other things which might fall within the boundaries of PC and woke, which you simply can't talk about. You might even get prosecuted in some circumstances. I mean, we're living in some sort of mad upside down world at the moment. We've watched in Scotland the SNP collapsing, not least because of some of their very wacky legislation, which has also been enormously expensive. Meantime, I'm of the opinion, and I'm not particularly right wing, but I am of the opinion that ordinary people, sometimes they just want to see the potholes mended. You know, they don't want this sort of bit of PC legislation or another. There are far greater national priorities. And I'm not saying that there aren't small groups in society that haven't been badly treated in the past. They have. I can see that. and there has been real prejudice. But I think we have very immediate problems now. And they were all exacerbated by the COVID calamity and the government's reaction to it. I mean, I'm not afraid to say, did we really do the right thing? Should we have locked down? Should we have gone ahead with the vaccines? Or would it have made more sense to have given everybody in Britain a supply of vitamin C and vitamin D and maybe just vaccinated some people? But we don't talk about these things openly. It's a very controlled environment. And I was talking to a close friend of mine who's across the water in Northern Ireland and who's a very wise and sensible guy and involved in quite a lot of official stuff there. And I said to him, what is it? What is going on now? And he said, well, if I was to sum it up simply, Michael, I'd say that I don't feel free anymore. Well, I don't feel particularly free anymore. Peter, do you feel particularly free anymore? Have you sensed a change in the last 25 years, 20 years? Certainly in the last 10 years, I have. Well, I've certainly sensed a change, and I think that some of us actually want to speak what we believe is true, in spite of what happens, and other people cower away. And I always wonder why some of us accepted the COVID narrative and some didn't. And I mean, in the UK, I've been intrigued with the, I guess, few high profile people who are willing to talk. So you've got Andrew Bridgen in politics, but in the U.S. you've got many politicians. Or in the U.K. you've got Professor Dalgleish, on with us a few weeks ago. In the U.S. you've got much higher profile people like Dr. McCullough or Dr. Malone. And even with the statisticians, you've got Professor Norman Fenton doing the stats. But in the U.S. you've got people like Steve Kirsch who are very high profile. And I'm kind of intrigued at why in the US, those who are opposing the narrative maybe get more free reign, but are lauded more, I think. And those in the UK seem to be really pushing up a brick wall every time. I don't know if you've seen that as well. Of course I have seen that, yes. And in some senses, the US is freer than the UK, and they do have a First Amendment, which means a bit. There is a lot of, America's a strange society and I went to school there so I know it quite well and although America is free on paper and although they do have a first amendment traditionally there has been something of a tyranny of public opinion, but the people that have spoken out, as far as the vaccine is concerned, and indeed about the war in Ukraine. And I think often they're saying the wrong thing on that, but we can come on to that later. But those people have been speaking out in a way that we haven't really seen in the UK, sadly. And you have to ask, what is going on? Why is that? I heard a comment by Ahmed Malik the other day. Do you know how many doctors there are in the UK, qualified medical doctors? I was stunned when I discovered how many, but I believe it's about 300,000. And I think it's something like 75,000 GPs, which is quite a lot. But do you know how many doctors have spoken up and gone counter-narrative? I believe the correct number is 10. I mean, that is extraordinary, isn't it? 10. And I mean, just from our own experience of social media. It's very, very few. And those doctors who risk it, risk everything. They risk being cancelled. They're on comfortable livings. They're on £100,000 a year plus in most cases, sometimes quite a lot more than that. If they speak out, they risk being struck off. They risk losing a comfortable lifestyle, the mortgage, possibly the family and whatever. And the result that hardly any at all have spoken out. But what we can assume is that there are many, like one particular friend I'm thinking of, who are very sceptical of what's been happening, very sceptical of the way the vaccine was launched, the lack of testing, all this stuff that we might draw attention to. And they're not necessarily anti-vaxxers. They're just people that are normally sceptical. But it seems that we're not allowed to be normally sceptical anymore. You have to follow this big state, Big Brother, 1984 line or watch out. And that really does disturb me. And I was listening, as I said, just before we came on with this program to a BBC thing on censorship, where the BBC is chastising the Russians and the Iranians, and, all sorts, the Chinese and talking about the billions that the Russians and the Chinese spread on info spend on information now, which they do. And much of it is mis and disinformation, but they do not talk about their own authoritarianism. And how they limited discussion on anything to do with COVID and indeed on the Ukraine war. And my own position, I'll just interject very briefly. I mean, I think that, Putin has to be stopped and I'm fully with the Ukraine people in what they're doing. But it's also a fact that Ukraine is one of the most corrupt countries in Europe, arguably more corrupt than Russia. And if we're giving them billions and billions and lots of military materiel, some of that is going to go missing. Some of that's going to go to the wrong places. And we never really discuss that. And it's not a particularly democratic place. And it's also the case that we probably pushed it politically in a particular direction because it was to our strategic interest, which is probably the right thing to do. But we can't discuss any of this anymore. And that does disturb me. Open discussion, open intellectual discussion on military matters, on health matters is becoming more and more difficult. And that's not a healthy sign, Peter. It certainly is. And actually, it's intriguing because my line would be, actually, these are, when I was younger, it would be interventionist. No, actually, it's, well, it's a separate country. They can do what they want. And if they want to have a war, they can have a war. But talking to people who have been very supportive, maybe more of the Ukraine side, talking to Krzysztof Bosak, MP in Poland yesterday. Yesterday and he was saying that Poland have given so much actually now Poland have very little to defend themselves and you look at the UK military, we didn't have much before and now it seems that we're short of munitions, short of many items and it seems that the west have poured so much into this without thinking of how to defend themselves. I mean, you understand the military side. What are your thoughts on that? Well, my thoughts at the moment, and it's been something I've been thinking about a lot recently, is that Britain is hopelessly under-defended. Our army is probably half the size it needs to be. Our navy is incapable of undertaking independent operations. It's probably just generally incapable. I think we're down to tiny numbers of jet fighters, tiny numbers of main asset ships. And we're saying, we're being told the army's around 72,000, something like that now. I think in real terms, it's actually smaller than that. And it's not big enough to meet the threat. And what's quite clear from what's going on in Ukraine is that you have to have a supply of ammunition, of missiles, of men. And this is worrying because if they came to a global conflict, it would go nuclear very quickly now, if it did go nuclear, because would our politicians actually ultimately press the button or not? I don't know. But it would have to go nuclear or something because we don't have the conventional resources. You know, they're just not there anymore. And most people have no idea of this. They have no experience of the military. But I would say that, they're talking about increasing defence spending to, you know, something under 3%. I would say that our defence spending at the moment should be probably at least 5% and maybe quite a lot more than that. This is a very, very unstable period in the history of the world. And we are not ready to meet the threat that exists. And of course, the Russians, I mean, they're routinely saying on their media that they're going to sink, you know, they'd sink Britain. They talk about sinking Britain specifically. And I don't think that they could do that. I don't think they would act on that. But we are incredibly vulnerable. We are essentially one big, you know, landing strip and It's not a good situation at all. And most people just block it. It's not that they're not worried about it, but they don't want to be worried about it. It's just one thing more and too much to think about. And they don't have any experience of the military anyway. But we're now looking to Ukraine and we're wondering, will the Ukrainians manage to hold off the Russians before the increased aid reaches them? I don't know. I don't know. No, I think the situation is not as positive for the Russians as some people might think. They do have problems. They can act at a small level. They can act operationally, but they can't necessarily act strategically. They don't have the resources to that, but they are building up resources. And I think something like, is it 30 or 40% of their available national resources are now going into defence, which is a remarkable figure. Now, they've lost a lot of men. we don't know really how many people have died in the Ukraine. It's certainly tens of thousands and maybe into the hundreds of thousands. It's a meat grinder. And the Russians, of course, just threw all their troops into this sort of first world war-like encounter. And they didn't really care about losses initially. It's not the Russian style, but also they were throwing people who'd been recruited from prisons, Pezhorin, the Wagner group, you know, many of those people were sacrificed, and I don't think anyone really cared about them in Russia very much. A dreadful situation. We won't go into the ethics and morality of that. Pretty scary, though. They will want to try and overwhelm those Ukrainian lines, and it's a huge front line. I mean, we're talking a front line, I think it's extending over a thousand kilometres or something. It's massive. They will try and overwhelm that line, and probably with the help of US and our own intelligence and a few other things, they'll probably stem the tide. But it's a 50-50. It's by no means a given. And that is worrying, because what would happen then? What would happen to the Poles? What indeed would happen to us? So yeah, good question. I was, it was fun watching the response from NATO members to Trump's call for them to actually pay the bills. Because I think it was, I remember watching Desert Storm and being just, consumed by it I guess as a young teenager and you've got the cameras following it all, now we come to whenever Britain sent tornadoes supposedly to help Israel and we were just told that's what happened, there was very little independent reporting, who knows if it happened or not. I think it was probably, it hit me, the reduction size of our military, whenever we bought, it was 67 apache attack helicopters, I think 67, wow, what are we going to do with those, I mean, half of them won't work half the time if they're in the desert with sand in their engines. But you realize that if the West do not have a strong military, then that deterrent basically is removed. And it means that other countries like Russia, who will spend more in defence, actually think, well, we can do what we like. They can do what they like because the West just aren't, one, aren't able to intervene, I guess, because of weakness in leadership, which we see in the EU, the US, Europe and in the UK, but also because of lack of military firepower. And I guess that's just a changing of the guard from the power of the West over to other centres of power. Well, I think the strategic implications of the weakness and the perceived weakness of our leadership are big. And, you know, that is in looking from Moscow. I mean, the farce we've seen in Westminster in recent years must be very encouraging to you where, you know, they have the strong, the classic Soviet era and now Russian era strongman. Putin is developing this aura as the strong man, which is a popular one in Russia. He has complete dominance of his home media, so he manages to mislead people as to what's actually going on elsewhere as well. He's looking for an external foe, an external threat, a long-time ploy of any authoritarian leader trying to make sure he stays in power. And of course, Putin doesn't have much choice, does he? If he doesn't succeed in staying in power, he's got a very scary future ahead of him. So that's another intriguing issue. The only good thing I would say, and this is, I don't think I'd like to fight the Poles or indeed the Ukrainians. They're both very, very tough nations. But where this now leads, and this is another critical question, we don't really know what's going on. When this conflict started, and I was a reporter in Lebanon, for Time, I was a photojournalist for Time in the Lebanon and we were sending stuff back that was really from the front line and it was really interesting and people, what I noticed when I went there, intriguingly to Lebanon in the 80s, was I was familiar with it all because i'd seen it all on the evening news. But I wasn't familiar with the feeling and the smell. Now, I can't say that with Ukraine, because for most of this conflict, I didn't know, and most people didn't know what the hell was going on. The quality of the reporting, I thought, was very, very poor. I've seen some better reporting since, but generally, I thought the reporting initially was awful. And there was also a tremendous amount of pro-war propaganda. I know somebody who went to the theatre in London and apparently, you know, when it came to the intermission or something, a huge Ukrainian flag came down and the whole audience were expected to cheer as we're all expected to cheer for the NHS or for all the vaccine stuff. I'm just temperamentally opposed to that sort of control, that sort of psychological manipulation. It concerns me that people should be made to support anything unthinkingly and that seems to be what's happening now and you've got Facebook for example, I mean they were at one stage I think advertising how they could turn opinion to potential advertisers and we've seen all the Cambridge Analytica stuff, we're incredibly vulnerable now to all this online stuff and the thing that bothers me if I go back to Twitter where I have something of a presence, is I can't really tell my stuff now because nobody sees it, there is some sort of censorship algorithm or something in place. I've got 77 000 followers there allegedly, I don't know how many of them are bots but sometimes it's clear that hardly anybody sees something that I put out particularly if it concerns the vaccines or if I'm making critical comment about Mr Putin. I think I blocked 2000 odd, what I thought were probably Russian accounts. But ironically, I'm actually getting taken down myself sometimes by the Twitter algorithms. I don't know who's controlling them. I don't know if they're controlled by Twitter Central or they're controlled somewhere else. But hey, I hope so. I think I'm one of the good guys. But you're not allowed to be a good guy. You've got to be a black and white guy now. That's the thing I think you see on social media, which is also meantime, in a very unhealthy way, polarizing people. It encourages the extremes. You can't be a traditional conservative very easily. You can't be a moderate very easily or a classical liberal very easily. You've got to go to one pole or the other pole. I think that's just very unhealthy. It's unhealthy apart from anything else as far as intellectual debate's concerned. Let me pick up on that with where we fit in and the ability to, I guess, speak your mind and have a position where you put your country first, which I thought was always a normal position, but now supposedly is an extremist position. But how, I mean, I'm curious watching what's happening in Europe which is me slightly separate, the European parliamentary elections and the wave of putting nations first and it's called nationalism. I think it's putting your country first which actually should be what a nation is about and the second thing is your neighbour and those around you, but we haven't really seen that in the UK. I mean do you think that will be a change of how your because Europe is really a declining force in the world, not only economically, but militarily. And of course, we haven't made the best of leaving the EU at all. We've cocked up big time on that. But then you look across to Europe and it is a declining power. And I'm wondering whether this new change, this opposition to unfair immigration. Opposition to control, central control from Brussels, wanting to put the nations first, whether that actually will be a change in Europe's fortunes. Bring me back to central control. But before we say anything else, just look at Norway. They had the wonderful resource of their oil reserves, and they spent it well. They created a sovereign national fund. And I think it means that everyone in Norway's got half a million quid or something like that. We, on the other hand, have squandered our national resources. And the country appears to be in tatters at the moment, and they can't even mend the potholes. Going to this business of Europe and the decline, yes, it's worrying that, Europe almost is losing the will to defend itself, or it seems to. But beyond that, if you look at Brexit, I mean, I was a Brexiteer, and I was a Brexiteer who could see some of the economic arguments for Remain. So again, I had a nuanced position on it. But overall, I wanted to preserve British sovereignty and democracy, and I thought it was disgraceful that we should be turning over that to some body in Brussels. But what we didn't realize, those of us who were pushing for Brexit, that the real threat wasn't Brussels, but the real threat probably was some globalist entity that we didn't even understand. And nobody was really much talking about globalism at that point. They weren't talking about Davos and all that sort of stuff. They were talking about the threat from Brussels but what we've seen since Brexit I think is an even greater threat from, I think what that Greek ex-foreign minister calls techno feudalism and the sort of, the onward march of somewhat Marxist influenced, capitalism facilitated by the whole digital deal, And you have WEF stuff where, you'll own nothing and you'll be happy, although they're withdrawing from that comment now. But who are these people? Did we elect them? We had a sort of interest in the people in Brussels, sort of, but as far as these globalist characters are concerned, they have no democratic mandate whatsoever. And that is pretty scary. Their only mandate is enormous wealth and a sort of arrogance that they know best for us, the peons, what our future should be. I do find that a bit terrifying, but I also, this is where it gets interesting, Peter, because I see where it came from. If you look at the era after the Second World War, the Americans and us, we were very worried about Soviet influencing operations. So we started to do stuff. And one of the things, the European community was perhaps one of those things, NATO was the most obvious, but there were also all sorts of influencing operations to counter the then very common, prolific, and increasingly dangerous Soviet influencing operations directed at Europe, directed at Latin America. So, for example, at Harvard, and I found this out from reading a biography of Henry Kissinger recently. At Harvard in the early 50s, they were running young leaders courses for foreign influencers. And it looked very much like the same sort of deal that the WEF was doing with everyone's Trudeau et al. They've all been a WEF young leader. Now, I would guess that that comes, that WEF stuff probably comes from Harvard or something like that via the State Department pushing into academia and then creating the WEF, maybe or having a hand in it as an influencing op. But this is where it gets really interesting. Has somebody penetrated that influencing op? Has it been turned? Whose interests does it actually operate in now? We know big money. Yeah, big money. But is it really in our individual interest as citizens of these countries and as customers of these massive corporations that seek to influence so much now and trespass onto the realm of politics and social engineering? By what right? You know, what happened to democracy? Aren't we meant to be deciding what's going on in our country, what our values are? It seems not. Democracy seems less important, I mean you look at Andrew Bridgen lecturing to an almost empty House of Commons on excess deaths and you think what on earth is going on there, what is this? I don't get it and I don't get why there is not free discussion on many other subjects in parliament now and it disturbs me. We developed this system, it's a pretty good system with faults as Churchill said, the problem with it is more the case that all the other systems are worse. And I think that's probably true. I mean, I'm a believer in democracy, but our democracy is in a pretty bad way. And it's not just our democracy, all over the Western world. We seem to have rolled over. And I do wonder to what extent the Russians, the Chinese and others have deliberately undermined us, captured our institutions, maybe captured our media. You know, these are things that one isn't allowed to say normally, but I'm saying them now. I mean, to what extent have we been captured and who by? If you saw the Yuri Bezmenov film from the 70s and 80s, have you seen that? Oh, you must, Yuri Bezmenov, about subversion and the long-term KGB operations to subvert the West. Very interesting, and it all seems to have come true. Yuri Bezmenov, you'll find it on YouTube. Yeah. What has happened to us? Our society is almost unrecognizable. Go back 20 years. I mean, think of the restrictions on driving in London, on smoking, let alone lockdown and vaccines, and thou shalt do this, and you must do that, and if you don't, we'll fine you, and you've got no power at all, and we've got complete control over your life, and it's a 200-pound fine for this and for whatever. We are so controlled and put down now. And again, I have an interesting theory and I don't get the chance to talk about it much, but I wonder if when you see a lot of crime and you see a lot of crime, particularly amongst young people, and you see a lot of strange, violent crime, I wonder if that is a consequence of too much central control. I wonder if that's a psychological and sociological consequence of a society which is becoming too controlled. And that's a subject I never hear discussed, but it's a very interesting one because I think a lot of us are concerned about crime, street crime, you know, mad people on the roads, which you see, I noticed personally, a lot more crazy driving than I was aware of maybe five or 10 years ago. But we don't discuss this stuff. We don't discuss the fact that the average person isn't really very happy now, that the average kid, this does get discussed a bit, is very anxious, maybe having treatment for this or that sort of psychological problem, that what used to be the normal tribulations of life now become things that you need to seek out treatment for. Well, maybe what you really need to do is seek out treatment for your society because your society is creating people that just aren't happy. And we should explore that. But again, that's another big subject. Well, I've been intrigued talking to friends growing up behind the Iron Curtain and talking about the Stasi or the state police reporting on people, turning everyone into informers, and then having Xi Van Fleet on the other day. And she was talking about the Red Guards, who were Mao's army, in effect, in communist China. And you realize that control whenever individuals are called out by the media because they go against the narrative. We've seen that under the COVID tyranny or seen that when Andrew Bridgen spoke the last time, the leader of the House, Penny Mordaunt, warned him to be very careful of the dangerous language he is using on social media. She meant that he is saying something which is different than government, and that's not accepted. And in effect, it's the same, I guess, control as you saw under communism that we are now seeing here, where people are called out for having a different opinion and being threatened that if they continue, there will be consequences. Would you have seen that sort of control 50 years ago or before the Second World War? I mean, you know, I'm no communist, but there used to be communist members of parliament. There used to be an extremely wide range of opinion represented in parliament. Now it seems we're entering the age of the monoculture and the mono-party, and alternative opinions just aren't acceptable anymore. There is one canonized text, and you've got to repeat that mantra, and if not, you're a non-person. I mean, where did that come from? That isn't our tradition. But is that the push of the woke agenda, is it the decline of Christianity, is it weak leadership, I mean you kind of look and I want to understand where this is coming from, because if you understand where it's coming from then you can begin to tackle it. But it does seem to be many different facets of it from different angles. I think, was it GK Chesterton 'once we stop believing in anything, we'll start believing in everything' I think that is part of it, I think people don't believe in very much so they just believe in their own selfish bubble and materialism and I think this actually goes back to Oxford, I think there is actually some school of philosophy that encouraged this idea that as the old authorities declined, whether that was the the monarchy or whatever it might be, a faith in authority that you would have to find a new way of controlling the public and that the simplest way to do that was by their material self-interest and this is what Thatcher and Reagan essentially appeared to do, well actually looking back at Reagan now I actually think he said some very sensible stuff, but it appears that we were manipulated by our material desires. That replaced the old world. But it's meant that we're living in a rather scary, chaotic, morally upside down and confused world now. And it's certainly not the world that you and I remember. And it must be very scary for kids. I mean, I was speaking to a young person the other day, and I was really surprised because they told me that they didn't watch the news and they were a bright kid. And they said, well, why? They said, well, I don't want to. I don't want to have anything to do with it. And I don't want to have anything to do with history either. And I thought to myself, my God, if you have a young person who was soon to be a voting age, who's not watching any news, who doesn't want to have anything to do with history, how are they going to be able to make the right decisions for our future? And what sort of world are they living in? You know, where's their thought space now? Yeah, I thought that was very worrying. But that's, I mean, to finish on that, that's really just part of the information war because now young people get, I don't know how to define young people, but they get their information, their worldview from TikTok. So you've got the Chinese government actually pushing that and forcing that. And it is concerning whenever, from a 60 second video someone can decide what the world is and how they fit into it and that's the depth of knowledge they're going to find and I think that shallowness is where we are with the next generation coming. Yeah I mean I've got to hope that there's some young people that aren't as shallow as that and I certainly do talk to to some who aren't, I mean I've got kids of my own, four kids, and generally speaking, they're pretty switched on. We don't have the same views, generally speaking, but they're pretty switched on. But it is scary that there's a whole generation of young people that, I mean, you see them, you wander down the street, you see every kid has got, there they are, they've got the mobile phone and they're like zombies looking at the mobile phone. And it's not just kids for that matter. It's, you see middle-aged people doing the same thing. You see them sitting at tables in a restaurant and they're still tapping at the screen. Whoever controls this controls you, controls your mind, controls what you think are your opinions, because many of your opinions are not really your opinions. They're things that have been implanted in you by these massively influential modern means. Now, television always did that to a degree. The newspapers always did it to a degree. But this seems to be a more direct route into people's heads, particularly young people's heads. And that is genuinely disturbing. Now, if you look to Europe, you mentioned Europe earlier. If you look at Europe, it seems to be swaying to the right. My guess is that, Britain will probably sway to the left until maybe there's a failure of the Starmer dream after probably, they might run for two terms. And then our future is very uncertain and again, rather scary. But what I don't see is enough discussion, enough activity. I don't see a dynamic middle. Hopefully, I mean, very intriguing, isn't it? Who is Starmer? What does he represent? Is he a Blairite? So is that some sort of globalist, centrist, capitalized position? I don't know. I tend to think it is. I tend to think that's where it's coming from. It's not the traditional left. But of course, Starmer has some history of being on the left, not to a great extreme. But it is worrying that the left could still creep into power via Starmer's government. It's also a bit frightening, and am I saying this, that what happens if Starmer's government fails? I mean, as it probably will. The economics are against it. Britain is not looking in a good place at all. But what I think we need, the one thing that will save us is open discussion, proper, unfettered, open discussion about politics, about health, about philosophy, about everything else. And I try in my life in a small way to start those conversations with people. And I do it across politics. I do it across religion. I talk to almost everyone I meet, if I can, and I think I get away with it, and start bringing up some of these difficult subjects. Mike, I really do appreciate coming on. As I said at the beginning, I've really enjoyed your Twitter handle. And I know we've touched on many things on censorship, military and politics. And I'm sure we will have you back on again soon. So thank you so much for your time today. Well, I've really enjoyed the opportunity. And I'll just say this in conclusion. I've actually managed this. I've had the tinnitus and this terrible migraine all through the interview, but we got through it, which is great. I do say to people out there, do take seriously the people who tell you they've been vaccine injured because it's a big deal if you have. God bless you Peter.

On this episode of the Reaction Podcast, host Iain Martin is joined by Tim Shipman, chief political commentator at The Sunday Times, to talk about his new book, No Way Out: Brexit: From the Backstop to Boris. They discuss the political gambles, successes and failures that led Brexit Britain to where it is today, the legacy of Theresa May's premiership, what the Brexit moment tells us about historical revolutionary times, the dishonesty of both Brexiteers and Remainers and the future of Britain outside the EU.

Zelfs Geert Wilders heeft ontdekt hoe fijn toch die goeie ouwe E.E.G. was. Bijna alle partijen op extreem en nationalistisch rechts en links hebben hun beloften van een Nexit-Frexit-Grexit-Hungrexit-Danexit laten schieten. Zij zijn ‘de gebrande kinderen van Nigel Farage', zegt PG Kroeger. En zo ontstaat in deze EP-campagne onverwacht ineens een heel nieuw debat over de toekomst van Europa.PG duikt daarom met Jaap Jansen in de diepere motivaties van zulke partijen - als PVV, BBB en nu ook NSC in ons land - voor die nieuwe EU-koers. Want het valt al snel op dat de exit-bepleiters ook bij hun nieuwe pleidooi voor 'hervorming van binnenuit' dezelfde argumenten blijven hanteren waarmee Farage en Johnson hun Brexit-campagne voerden. Licht aangepast om de gewenste uitkomst wat te verhullen. De gouden bergen voor 'bestaanszekerheid' en de verzekering dat al het fijne van de EU ongemoeid zal blijven klinken ook nu weer.***Deze aflevering is mede mogelijk gemaakt met donaties van luisteraars die we hiervoor hartelijk danken. Word ook vriend van de show!Deze aflevering bevat een advertentie van de Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. Wist je dat de VU naast bachelors en masters ook onderwijs voor professionals aanbiedt? Ga naar vu.nl/vrijedenkersHeb je belangstelling om in onze podcast te adverteren of ons te sponsoren? Zend een mailtje naar adverteren@dagennacht.nl en wij zoeken contact.Op sommige podcast-apps kun je niet alles lezen. De complete tekst en een overzicht van al onze eerdere afleveringen vind je hier***De bijstelling van het anti-Europese discours van de PVV en haar verwanten kent een duidelijke inspirator: Viktor Orbán. De Hongaarse premier en strateeg heeft bijna een kunstwerkje gemaakt van zijn aanpak van het 'cakeism'. Hij doet wat Boris Johnson nooit lukte: “To have your cake and eat it too.” Zijn leerlinge Giorgia Meloni, de premier van Italië, past deze inmiddels zeker zo behendig toe.Het is daarom nuttig in de historie én de mythologie te duiken van die postuum nu zo vereerde E.E.G. Wie zich verdiept in de politiek, economie en cultuur van 1957 tot en met de jaren '70 begrijpt wel hoeveel nostalgische potentie die EEG van toen heeft. Het zijn de rozige jeugdjaren van de 'boze burgers' van nu, een tijdperk van een economie in turbo-bloei, van het eerste massa-consumentisme en toerisme, van de televisie, verzoening en idealisme, chianti in een mandfles, de Beatles en explosieve salarisverhogingen en banen voor iedereen. Het best beluisterde radioprogramma in de tweede helft van de jaren '70 was de Europarade, een Europese hitlijst. Europa was jong, hip en happening!En de EEG was lekker overzichtelijk. Het gaf een douane-unie, protectionisme en stabiliteit, exportmarkten en gesubsidieerd voedsel. Maar geheel vergeten lijkt hoe snel dit mechanisme uit het lood dreigde te lopen. Vergeten is 'de Lege Stoel' van Charles de Gaulle, de heftige strijd om een politieke unie tegen een mercantiele unie.En vergeten lijkt hoe de EG na 1970 - mede door Richard Nixon en de oliecrisis - in zwaar weer terecht kwam en eigenlijk volledig vastliep. Wie aan die E.E.G. zonder mededogen een eind hielp maken? De door Brexiteers en E.E.G.-nostalgici zo verafgode Margaret Thatcher.Zou een volgend kabinet de lijn van de 'E.E.G.-nostalgie' voor hervormingen van binnenuit gaan voeren, dan moeten Kamer en regering wel op hun tellen passen. De EU heeft voldoende ervaring én instrumenten in huis om zo'n lidstaat met de neus op de feiten te drukken. Niet elke premier bezit het brutaal vernuft en de machtspositie in eigen land als een Viktor Orbán bovendien.Daar komt nog bij dat twee Italiaanse oud-premiers nu met een gedurfd pakket van zulke 'interne hervormingen' komen. Enrico Letta en Mario Draghi trekken de consequenties uit de nieuwe, turbulente geopolitieke omstandigheden en stellen dat de 27 EU-listaten samen voor eenzelfde uitdaging staan als 'De zes' met Jean Monnet in 1952. Zou 'Den Haag' als antwoord daarop komen met een 'Terug naar de E.E.G. van 1958' zal het nieuwe kabinet zich marginaliseren en isoleren. Een Orbán of Meloni zou in elk geval nooit zo dom zijn zich in zo'n doodlopende straat te begeven.***Verder luisteren411 - Negen opmerkelijke aspecten van de Europese Unie407 - Cruciale Europese verkiezingen378 - Dertig jaar na 'Maastricht' is Europa toe aan een nieuwe sprong voorwaarts344 - Nederland in Europa: een masterclass door Tom de Bruijn340 – Caroline van der Plas ontvangt Frans Timmermans. Vijf misverstanden over Europa336 - Timothy Garton Ash: Hoe Europa zichzelf voor de derde keer opnieuw uitvindt328 – Nieuwe rauwe wereld. Brexit, what Brexit?299 - Dramatische verschuivingen in de wereldpolitiek. Europa heeft eindelijk een telefoonnummer290 - Bondskanselier Olaf Scholz en de razendsnelle ontwikkeling van de EU272 - Dankzij Poetin: nu écht intensief debat over de toekomst van Europa223 - De degelijke daadkracht van Mario Draghi's Italië124 - 95 jaar Jacques Delors109 - Mathieu Segers: Sterke lidstaten maken Europa sterk107 - Jean Monnet, de vader van Europa100 - Nederland in Europa: lusten en lasten door de eeuwen heen63 - Judit Varga, minister van Justitie van Hongarije: lessen uit de geschiedenis***Tijdlijn00:00:00 – Deel 100:36:39 – Deel 201:08:56 – Deel 301:47:00 – EindeZie het privacybeleid op https://art19.com/privacy en de privacyverklaring van Californië op https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

On today's show, Niall joins us on the day of the new Hate Crime legislation introduced in Scotland, today, April 1st which he deems is the death of free speech. Niall is leading a protest later today outside Holyrood in the capital. GUEST 1 OVERVIEW: Lee Harris is a Commentator who specialises in Politics. He also describes himself as a Brexiteer and a Conservative. GUEST 2 OVERVIEW: Niall Fraser is a Scottish political commentator and a proud member of the Official Scottish Family Party @scotfamparty

One of the first thing that economists are taught is the Free Trade is a Good Thing. One thing that economists don't speak too much about is that free trade creates both winners and losers. Arguably, not nearly enough attention has been paid to the losers.Whether or free trade is always a net positive depends on many factors. And the alternatives to free trade - the choices made by politicians about things like protectionism - can be even worse. That said, China's accession to the World Trade Organisation was a huge shock and wiped out huge swathes of manufacturing industry and jobs throughout the developed world. Too much too soon seems have been the case. Those left behind communities became the hunting ground for Trump, Brexiteers and populists. They stil are - and there is a distinct possibility of a second China shock coming our way. What will be the results this time?Irish SMEs complain about government inspired costs and regulatory burdens. Are they right to moan? A lot of SMEs are either failing or in danger of going bust.Interest rates: the new normal isn't too far away from where they are now. Discuss. Become a member at https://plus.acast.com/s/the-other-hand-with-jim.power-and-chris.johns. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On today's show, Lee Harris discusses Laurence Fox's recent guilty verdict by OFCOM for breaking their rules, while noting that others with potentially worse wrongdoings have not faced similar consequences. GUEST 1 OVERVIEW: Lee Harris is a Commentator who specialises in Politics. He also describes himself as a Brexiteer and a Conservative. GUEST 2 OVERVIEW: Benn is a Social Commentator watching the world burn! Broadcaster who likes to talk…A LOT. Autistic and opinionated.

Why do the right-wing intelligentsia keep talking Britain down? Didn't they get all they ever wanted when we left the EU? And who are the worst culprits? Plus: Remember when Rishi Sunak became Prime Minister and promised to fix the economy? Yes, well last week it emerged that Britain had entered a recession – nailed it. Has he completely failed on all his other goals too? That's Oh God, What Now? with our special guest, political comedian Alistair Barrie. “The blame game is the only game in town as far as Sunak's concerned.” – Alistair Barrie. “Reform has done nothing but set about alienating black, ethnic minority voters.” – Zoe Grunewald. “Down with the NIMBYS!” – Rachel Cunliffe. “Oh that woke blob with their tofu!” – Alistair Barrie. “Most of us don't give a fuck about tax cuts, most of us care about things actually working.” – Alistair Barrie. We're on YouTube!: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCVOIkIWUDtu7VrVcFs0OI0A  www.patreon.com/ohgodwhatnow Presented by Alex Andreou with Zoe Grunewald, Rachel Cunliffe, and guest Alistair Barrie. Producers: Chris Jones. Audio production by: Robin Leeburn. Group Editor: Andrew Harrison. Managing Editor: Jacob Jarvis. OH GOD, WHAT NOW? is a Podmasters production.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

On today's show, Lee Harris discusses the inhabitants of Bibby Stockholm converting to Christianity. Later, Jasmine Birtles raises questions about the government's allocation of funds, pondering why they can't seem to find money for housing, care, health, education, and other essential needs, while readily allocating funds for war. GUEST 1 OVERVIEW: Lee Harris is a political commentator who specializes in politics and identifies as a Brexiteer and a Conservative. Notably, Lee received a retweet from Elon Musk this week, and his post has reached 33 million people so far. GUEST 2 OVERVIEW: Jasmine is a TV presenter and a money expert regularly featured on BBC TV, Channel 5, Sky News, Channel 4, and ITV.

Rishi Sunak faces a Brexiteer backlash over his DUP deal because of fears it will hamper Britain's ability to break free from EU rules.Former Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith says this deal raises concerns for Northern Ireland's ability to change regulations. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It's been four years since we formally left the EU - and its been eight years of trying to square an impossible circle. How do you keep Brexiteers happy, the EU on board and Northern Ireland's government up and running, all at once?Well today Rishi came through with a deal which might - big emphasis MIGHT hit the spot. We take you through what we know. Later, Nicola Sturgeon explains to the Scotland Covid inquiry which she didn't, sorry did, sorry didn't really delete her WhatsApp messages. It all gets a bit emotional.Editor: Tom HughesSenior Producer: Gabriel RadusProducer: Laura FitzPatrickSocial Media Editor: Georgia FoxwellVideo Production: Shane Fennelly & Arvind BadewalYou can listen to this episode on Alexa - just say "Alexa, ask Global Player to play The News Agents".The News Agents is brought to you by HSBC UK - https://www.hsbc.co.uk/And, The News Agents now have merch! To get yours, head to: https://store.global.com/collections/the-news-agents

Nick Cohen gets the Lowdown on the UK's greatest taboo - the ever-deepening Brexit crisis - from Chris Grey, emeritus Professor @RoyalHolloway, and author of the highly-regarded and must-read blog,  Brexit and beyond.Extra Brexit food checks come in from next week - threatening food price rises and shortages. Meanwhile, the Tories fail to get one of its promised "Canada-style free trade agreements" with Canada! Every week, @chrisgreybrexit - also author of the book  Brexit Unfolded  - exposes the many absurdities, lies and disasters of the Brexit Britain clown show and explains how the Brexiteers' preposterous promises were never remotely deliverable and were always likely to cause huge damage to the UK's economy and standing in the world. For example,  we should now be seeing the Silicon Valley of the East End's Hoxton - as promised by @DanielJHannan. Er...where is it?Both Chris and Nick lament the chronic failure of the BBC and other MSM to hold to account the charlatans like Hannan , Boris Johnson and Nigel Farage who mis-sold Brexit. But how can Labour handle the Brexit mess they are set to inherit when so many people who voted for it refuse to accept the mayhem they were conned into inflicting on all of us?Support the showListen to The Lowdown from Nick Cohen for in-depth analysis of the issues and events that shape our lives and futures. From Ukraine to Brexit, from Trump to the Tories - we hope to keep you informed - and sane! @NickCohen4

We've all felt shame. But it's more than an emotion – it's also a political weapon. All manners of politicians, including recent figures like Trump and various Brexiteers, have utilised the feeling to pursue their ends. David Keen, the author of Shame: The Politics and Power of an Emotion, speaks to Alex Andreou to discuss the strength of shame and how it's been used throughout history.  www.patreon.com/bunkercast  Written and presented by Alex Andreou. Producer: Liam Tait. Audio production: Simon Williams. Managing Editor: Jacob Jarvis. Group editor: Andrew Harrison. Music by Kenny Dickinson. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On today's show, Luca Sorriso Valvo discusses the Elon Musk STARSHIP launch. Later, Neil will review all the biggest stories from the weekend in a paper review. GUEST OVERVIEW: Luca Sorriso Valvo is a space and solar physicist and astronaut trainer. GUEST OVERVIEW: Neil Liversidge is an Independent Financial Adviser who has worked in the sector since 1980. He runs his own business, West Riding Personal Financial Solutions Ltd in Castleford, West Yorkshire, which he founded in 2004, managing close-on £100m in assets. Neil was National Chairman of The Motorcycle Action Group, a bikers' lobby group, from 1989 to 2002, and in 1998 founded FEMA, the Federation of European Motorcyclists' Associations. Neil was re-elected MAG National Chairman again in 2021 and founded Transport Reality to campaign against the UK Government's proposed ban on fossil-fuelled private transport. Neil is an extensively published writer and describes himself as “100% a Brexiteer.” In broadcasting, Neil has worked with the BBC for many years, contributing to programs on political, financial and motorcycling issues. Neil's main leisure interests are motorcycling, history, music, movies, and DIY.

As the aftermath of Rishi Sunak's reshuffle rumbles on, Julia Hartley-Brewer speaks to former First Minister of Scotland Alex Salmond to get his thoughts on the last 24hrs of cabinet reshuffling.Julia is also joined by Former Defence Minister and Tory MP, Tobias Ellwood as well as ex-Adviser to Gordon Brown, Michael Jacobs. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On today's show, Spiros Catechis delves into Exploring Greece's Resilient Economic Revival Following a Period of Near Bankruptcy, focusing on key sectors and strategic reforms. Later, Simon Spanswick sheds light on the AIB 2023 Awards: Investigative Journalism, Free Speech Highlights, and 'Ningaloo Nyinggulu's' Australian Win: Examining the Impact and Achievements in Current Journalism. Additionally, Neil will review all the biggest stories from over the weekend in a paper review segment. GUEST 1 OVERVIEW: Spiros Catechis is an executive at IN-VR, a global promotion and consultancy firm. Specialising in energy sector opportunities, he engages with key decision makers across over 40 markets, focusing on energy transition technologies and sustainable development. https://www.in-vr.co/   GUEST 2 OVERVIEW: Simon Spanswick, founder director of AIB, possesses extensive experience in public and commercial sectors, specialising in digital broadcasting and journalism since the early 1980s. https://aib.org.uk   GUEST 3 OVERVIEW: Neil Liversidge is an Independent Financial Adviser who has worked in the sector since 1980. He runs his own business, West Riding Personal Financial Solutions Ltd in Castleford, West Yorkshire, which he founded in 2004, managing close-on £100m in assets. Neil was National Chairman of The Motorcycle Action Group, a bikers' lobby group, from 1989 to 2002, and in 1998 founded FEMA, the Federation of European Motorcyclists' Associations. Neil was re-elected MAG National Chairman again in 2021 and founded Transport Reality to campaign against the UK Government's proposed ban on fossil-fuelled private transport. Neil is an extensively published writer and describes himself as “100% a Brexiteer.” In broadcasting, Neil has worked with the BBC for many years, contributing to programs on political, financial and motorcycling issues. Neil's main leisure interests are motorcycling, history, music, movies, and DIY.      

On today's show, Simeon will discuss with Lembit the top stories of the day in Australia. Later, Joanne will talk to Lembit about the Electric Vehicle bubble bursting. Also, Neil will do a paper review of all the biggest stories from over the weekend. GUEST 1 OVERVIEW: Australian-born Aussie Cossack rose to prominence during the NSW lockdowns as an outspoken media personality notorious for his hilarious interactions with the NSW police and numerous large-scale campaigns against corrupt politicians. Boikov left Australia at the age of 18 to study at the Moscow Sretensky Seminary. It was here that he had his first posting as a journalist Whilst in Russia Boikov became heavily involved in the Russian Cossack movement. Upon returning to Australia Boikov was elected the Ataman of the Australian Cossack chapter and founded a pro-Russian political newspaper called Russian Frontier. In May of 2022 the Aussie Cossack was jailed for 10 months for breaching a suppression and non-publication order for content posted to his YouTube channel. After successfully winning an appeal against the severity of the sentence Aussie Cossack left prison. In December 2022 the Aussie Cossack defected to the Russian Consulate in Sydney where he was granted diplomatic asylum. From his studio within the Consulate building, he now broadcasts daily on TNT Radio. GUEST 2 OVERVIEW: Joanne Nova won prizes as a science grad and international awards as a blogger. She's author of The Skeptics Handbook which has been translated into 15 languages. Each day around 12,000 people read joannenova.com.au. In 2018 Jo toured Europe speaking about How to Destroy an Electricity Grid. Before blogging she hosted a children's TV series on Channel Nine, was a regular keynote speaker, and managed the Shell Questacon Science Circus. She was an associate lecturer in Science Communication at ANU. GUEST 3 OVERVIEW: Neil Liversidge is an Independent Financial Adviser who has worked in the sector since 1980. He runs his own business, West Riding Personal Financial Solutions Ltd in Castleford, West Yorkshire, which he founded in 2004, managing close-on £100m in assets. Neil was National Chairman of The Motorcycle Action Group, a bikers' lobby group, from 1989 to 2002, and in 1998 founded FEMA, the Federation of European Motorcyclists' Associations. Neil was re-elected MAG National Chairman again in 2021 and founded Transport Reality to campaign against the UK Government's proposed ban on fossil-fuelled private transport. Neil is an extensively published writer and describes himself as “100% a Brexiteer.” In broadcasting, Neil has worked with the BBC for many years, contributing to programs on political, financial and motorcycling issues. Neil's main leisure interests are motorcycling, history, music, movies, and DIY.

On today's show, Neil will conduct a paper review of the most significant stories from the weekend. Later in the show, we have an exclusive interview with Emma Bateman, who will shed light on her ongoing lawsuit against the Green Party. Additionally, Amy will provide us with an update on her legal case against the Tavistock Trust. She initiated this case after alleging that she was 'bullied and suspended from an NHS course' by 'woke' health chiefs, all because she stated that 'being white doesn't make you racist.' GUEST 1 OVERVIEW: Neil Liversidge is an Independent Financial Adviser who has worked in the sector since 1980. He runs his own business, West Riding Personal Financial Solutions Ltd in Castleford, West Yorkshire, which he founded in 2004, managing close-on £100m in assets. Neil was National Chairman of The Motorcycle Action Group, a bikers' lobby group, from 1989 to 2002, and in 1998 founded FEMA, the Federation of European Motorcyclists' Associations. Neil was re-elected MAG National Chairman again in 2021 and founded Transport Reality to campaign against the UK Government's proposed ban on fossil-fuelled private transport. Neil is an extensively published writer and describes himself as “100% a Brexiteer.” In broadcasting, Neil has worked with the BBC for many years, contributing to programs on political, financial and motorcycling issues. Neil's main leisure interests are motorcycling, history, music, movies, and DIY. GUEST 2 OVERVIEW: Emma Bateman is the former co-chair of Green Party Women Committee. GUEST 3 OVERVIEW: Amy Gallagher is a NHS nurse and political commentator.

On today's show, Neil will do a paper review of all the biggest stories over the weekend. Later, John will delve into Biden's visit and the President's urges to Americans to support funding for Israel. GUEST 1 OVERVIEW: Neil Liversidge is an Independent Financial Adviser who has worked in the sector since 1980. He runs his own business, West Riding Personal Financial Solutions Ltd in Castleford, West Yorkshire, which he founded in 2004, managing close-on £100m in assets. Neil was National Chairman of The Motorcycle Action Group, a bikers' lobby group, from 1989 to 2002, and in 1998 founded FEMA, the Federation of European Motorcyclists' Associations. Neil was re-elected MAG National Chairman again in 2021 and founded Transport Reality to campaign against the UK Government's proposed ban on fossil-fuelled private transport. Neil is an extensively published writer and describes himself as “100% a Brexiteer.” In broadcasting, Neil has worked with the BBC for many years, contributing to programs on political, financial and motorcycling issues. Neil's main leisure interests are motorcycling, history, music, movies, and DIY. GUEST 2 OVERVIEW: John Fine is a political scientist and writer, he's based in the US. 

Show notes and Transcript At long last it has happened. Andrew Bridgen MP (Reclaim Party) secured a debate on excess deaths in the UK Parliament.  Nearly twenty requests were turned down but Andrew simply would not give up.  His courage and determination to find out the truth won in the end.  Andrew gave a 25 minute presentation of all the data and facts which show a shocking rise in excess deaths since the covid jab rollout.  The fact that many people have died after receiving an injection appears to be the very reason every government wants total silence on this issue.  As you watch Andrew speak, be inspired to speak truth in the circles you find yourself in.  Use the information in the speech to arm yourself with the facts.  We now await a much longer 3 hour debate on excess deaths which Andrew is requesting. *This episode contains a background of the debate, the full speech by Andrew Bridgen MP, his message afterwards to the supporters gathered outside in Parliament Square and Peter catches a few words with the man himself. Andrew Bridgen  Member of Parliament for North West Leicestershire since 2010https://www.reclaimparty.co.uk/andrew-bridgen  Some Key Points Made During the Speech... - Ambulance calls for life-threatening emergencies ranged from a steady 2,000 calls per day until the vaccine rollout, from then it rose to 2,500 daily and calls have stayed at this level since.   - The surveillance systems designed to spot a safety problem have all flashed red, but no one's looking. - Payments for Personal Independent Payments (PIP) for people who have developed a disability and cannot work, have rocketed with the vaccine rollout and have continued to rise ever since. - The trial data showed that one in eight hundred injected people had a serious adverse event, meaning the risk of this was twice as high than the chance of preventing a Covid hospitalisation. - There were just over 14,000 excess deaths in the under 65-year-olds, before vaccination, from April 2020 to the end of March 2021. However, since that time there have been over 21,000 excess deaths in this age group alone. - There were nearly two extra deaths a day in the second half of 2021 among 15 – 19-year-old males,  but potentially even more if those referred to the coroner were fully included. Recorded 20.10.23 *Special thanks to Bosch Fawstin for recording our intro/outro on this podcast. Check out his art https://theboschfawstinstore.blogspot.com/ and follow him on GETTR https://gettr.com/user/BoschFawstin and Twitter https://twitter.com/TheBoschFawstin?s=20  To sign up for our weekly email, find our social media, podcasts, video, livestreaming platforms and more... https://heartsofoak.org/connect/ Support Hearts of Oak by purchasing one of our fancy T-Shirts.... https://heartsofoak.org/shop/ Please subscribe, like and share!   Subscribe now Transcript (Hearts of Oak) Hello, Hearts of Oak. Today we are here with Andrew Bridgen at a debate in Parliament, the first debate in this Parliament, on excess deaths. There's been very little debates, very little discussions on vaccine harms here. Of course, this is the issue that Andrew Bridgen MP was thrown out of the Conservative Party, the Tories, for beginning to raise the issue of vaccine harms and now raising the issue of excess deaths was simply is not discussed in this place. I've seen discussion in other parts of the world, especially Germany, with the AFD. But Andrew Bridgen has made this the hill that he will fight and die on. And he has been thrown out of the Conservative Party. He's lost that position he had for many years. Andrew Bridgen, of course, is one of the original Brexiteers, well known to any of us involved in the Brexit movement, in the UKIP movement. And Andrew has been fearless. He's one of those strange beasts in Westminster. He is led by conviction. He is led by courage and led by a desire to do what is right. And he had no desire to climb up the greasy pole. He's traditionally been a backbencher. So has stood his ground, kept his position as a lowly MP and not wanted to rise to the ministerial level, because that gives him the freedom to discuss what he wants. He's not held, he's not restricted by government restrictions, but he can say what he thinks and do what is right for his constituents, for those who vote for him, and realise that he is the servant of the people and he is not the servant of the government. So today there will be a debate led by Andrew Bridgen, I assume he will be one of maybe very few, one of one, who will actually speak on this. I'm really curious to see. I've seen a couple of Conservative, MPs who have touched on this, who have spoken a little bit about this, sometimes on GB News, but they have not gone as far as Andrew Bridgen. And Andrew Bridgen has gone this far. He has lost his job over it, and he doesn't care, because this is the right thing to do when a jab when an experimental vaccine, so-called vaccine, was rolled out and everyone was coerced and more or less forced to take it. Andrew was in that, he also took it, now regrets that and wants to keep raising the alarm on the ongoing effects of this and of course to challenge this government overreach that wants to force this upon everyone. This of course is a conservative government supposedly that stands up for freedom of speech, personal responsibility, rights, and yet all those traditional understandings of a conservative party have been completely upended and is no longer a party of freedom and liberty but is now a party of coercion and control. A number of MPs I assume will come in and speak after Andrew will present his position on excess deaths and ask the question, why is this? It seems to correlate to the rollout of the jab. You and I know that. We've seen the data. Andrew will be careful in how he puts it forward. He will use parliamentary language. He's skilled enough in this chamber to know what to say, what not to say, what connects with those in the chamber, and to win them over. Because ultimately, politics is about the art of persuasion. It is about winning the public over. And today, it is not necessarily the public is winning over, although you will watch the debate in a few moments, but actually is winning over MPs. And that also is crucial. Whatever you think, we still have 650 individuals and many of us mistrust absolutely, many of us detest. Many of us have had a traditional understanding of politics where there was a level of trust with our institutions and that included those in the building behind me. That is gone. I think for all of us, that is completely gone. And to have an individual who is a champion on the issue of curtailing that government overreach, asking questions, following the money, saying, was this just a push by big pharma for profits? Was this something darker? There are a whole load of areas we can go into, but Andrew has, wisely stayed within the areas he can understand. He has read papers, he has, understood them and he has presented those and I think he has been extremely wise on how far he has gone on this because it is a case of winning people over. That's what we have faced, all of us, over the last three years of winning friends, family, colleagues, connections over to persuade them that this is a dangerous experiment on not only the UK population but on the world population. We have a police car. I hope they don't want to arrest Andrew before his debate. I don't think even our government would do that, would they? Anyway, I will let you watch the debate, watch Andrew speaking, and then after I will try and catch up with a number of the people who have been here to support Andrew. I saw, Mike Yeadon earlier heading into the debate and I saw Matt Le Tissier earlier, I saw Fiona Hines earlier, I saw a big group of people who are here to support Andrew as he speaks truth and to let him know that he is not alone because it must feel very alone in that chamber. No one to back you, no one to support you and you feel as though you are a lonely voice crying out in the wilderness and yet. Many people have come to show Andrew that there are many people behind him who are indebted to him for actually speaking truth in this place and are standing with him shoulder-to-shoulder. So we'll hopefully talk to a few of those people after the debate. (Andrew Bridgen MP) Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. We've experienced more excess deaths since July 2021, than the whole of 2020. Unlike the pandemic, however, these deaths are not disproportionately of the old. In other words, the excessive deaths are striking down people in the prime of life. But no one seems to care. I fear history will not judge this House kindly. Worse still, in a country supposedly committed to free and frank exchange of views, it appears that no one cares that no one cares. Well, I care, Mr Deputy Speaker, and I credit those members here in attendance today who also care. And I'd also like to thank the Honourable Member for Lincoln for his support, and I'm, sorry that he couldn't attend today's debate. It's taken a lot of effort and more than 20 rejections to be allowed to raise this topic, But at last we're here to discuss the number of people dying. Nothing could be more serious. Numerous countries are currently gripped in a period of unexpected mortality, and no one wants to talk about it. It's quite normal for death numbers to fluctuate up and down by chance alone, but what we're seeing here is a pattern, repeated across countries, and the rise has not let up. I'll give way to my Honourable Gentleman.  (Phillip Davies MP) I'm very grateful and can I commend him for the tenacious way he's battled on this particular, issue. I certainly admire him for that. I just wonder where he found the media was in all of this, because of course during the Covid pandemic, every day, the media, particularly the BBC, couldn't wait to tell us how many people had died in that particular day without any context of those figures whatsoever. But they seem to have gone strangely quiet over these excess deaths now. (Andrew Bridgen MP) I thank the gentleman for his intervention. He's absolutely right. The media have let the British public down badly. There will be a full press pack going out to all media outlets following my speech with all the evidence to back up all the claims I'll make in that speech. But I don't doubt there'll be no mention of it in the mainstream media. You might think that a debate about excess deaths is going to be full of numbers. This speech does not have that many numbers because most of the important numbers have been kept hidden. Other data has been oddly presented in a distorted way, and concerned people seeking to highlight important findings and ask questions have found themselves inexplicably under attack. Before debating excess deaths, it's important to understand how excess death is determined. To understand if there is an excess, by definition you need to estimate how many deaths it would have been expected. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development used 2015-2019 as a baseline, and the Government's Office of Health Disparities and Improvement used its 2015-2019 baseline modelled to allow for ageing, and I've used that data here. Unforgivably, the Office of National Statistics have included deaths in 2021 as part of their baseline calculation for expected deaths, as if there was anything normal about the deaths in 2021. Exaggerating the number of deaths expected, the number of excess can be minimized. Why would the ONS want to do that? There's just too much that we don't know and it's not good enough Mr. Deputy Speaker. The ONS published promptly each week the number of deaths that were registered and while this is commendable it's not the data point that really matters. There's a total failure to collect, never mind publish, data on deaths that are referred for investigation to the coroner. Why does this matter? A referral means that it can be many months and, given the backlog, many years before a death is formally registered. Needing to investigate the cause of a death is fair enough. Failing to record when the death happened is not. Because of this problem, we actually have no idea how many people actually died in 2021. Even now, the problem is greatest for the younger age groups, where there's, a higher proportion of deaths are investigated. This date of failure is unacceptable. It must change. There's nothing in a coroner's report that can bring anyone back from the dead and those deaths should be reported. The youngest age groups are important not only because they should have their whole lives ahead of them. If there is a new cause of excess mortality across the board, it would not be noticed so much in the older cohorts because the extra deaths would be drowned out amongst the expected deaths. However, in the youngest cohorts, that is not the case. There were nearly two extra deaths a day in the second half of 2021 among 15 to 19 year old males, but potentially even more if those referred to the coroner were fully included. In a judicial review of the decision to vaccinate yet younger children, the ONS refused in court to give anonymised details about these deaths. They, admitted that the data they were withholding was statistically significant and I quote they said, the ONS recognises that more work could be undertaken to examine the mortality rates of young people in 2021 and intends to do so once more reliable data are available. How many more extra deaths in 15 to 19 year olds would it take to trigger such work? Surely the ONS should be desperately keen to investigate deaths in young men. Why else have an independent body charged with examining mortality data? Surely the ONS has a responsibility to collect data from the coroners to produce timely information? Let's move on to old people, because most deaths in the old are registered promptly and we do have a better feel for how many older people are dying. Deaths from dementia and Alzheimer's show what we ought to expect. There was a period of high mortality coinciding with COVID and lockdowns, but ever since there have been fewer deaths than expected. After a period of high mortality, we expect, and historically have seen, a period of low mortality because those who have sadly died cannot die again. Those whose deaths were slightly premature because of COVID and lockdowns, died earlier than they otherwise would have. This principle should hold true for every cause of death and every age group, but that's not what we're seeing. Even for the over 85-year-olds, according to the Office of Health Improvement and Disparities, there were 8,000 excess deaths, 4% above the expected levels, for the 12 months starting in July 2020. That includes all of the autumn 2020 wave of COVID, when we had tiering, the second lockdown, and it includes all of the first COVID winter. However, for the year starting July 2022, there have been over 18,000 excess deaths in this age group, 9% above expected levels, more than twice as many in a period when there should have been a deficit. And when deaths from diseases previously associated with old age were actually fewer than expected. Mr Deputy Speaker, I have raised my concerns around NG163 and the use of midazolam and morphine, which may have caused and may still be causing premature deaths in the vulnerable, but that is sadly a debate for another day. There were just over 14,000 excess deaths in the under 65-year-olds before vaccination from April 2020 to the end of March 2021. However, since that time there have been over 21,000 excess deaths, ignoring the registration delay problem, the majority, 58% of these deaths, were not attributed to Covid. We turned society upside down before vaccination for fear of excess deaths from Covid. Today we have substantially more excess deaths, and in younger people, and there's complete and eerie silence, Mr Deputy, Speaker. The evidence is unequivocal. There was a clear stepwise increase in mortality following the vaccine rollout. There was a reprieve in the winter of 2021-22 because there were fewer than expected respiratory deaths, but otherwise the excess has been incessantly at this high level. Ambulance data for England provides another clue. Ambulance calls for life-threatening emergencies were running at a steady 2,000 calls per day until the vaccine rollout. From then it rose to 2,500 daily and calls have stayed at this level since. The surveillance systems designed to spot a safety problem have all flashed red but no one's looking. Claims for personal independence payments for people who've developed a disability and cannot work rocketed with the vaccine rollout and it's, continued to rise ever since. The same was seen in the USA, also started with the vaccine rollout, not with Covid. A study to determine the vaccination status of a sample of such claimants, would be relatively quick and inexpensive to perform, yet nobody seems interested in ascertaining this vital information. Officials have chosen to turn a blind eye to this disturbing, irrefutable and frightening data, much like Nelson did, but for far less honourable reasons. He would be ashamed of us, Mr Deputy Speaker. Furthermore, data that has been used to sing the praises of the vaccines is deeply flawed. Only one COVID-related death was prevented in each of the initial major trials that led to authorisation of the vaccines and that is taking their data entirely at face value, whereas a growing number of inconsistencies and anomalies suggest we ought not to do this. Extrapolating from that means that between 15,000 and 20,000 people had to be injected to prevent a single death from COVID. To prevent a single COVID hospitalisation, over 1,500 people needed to be injected. The trial data showed that 1 in 800 injected people had a serious adverse event, meaning they were hospitalised or had a life-changing or life-threatening condition. The risk of this was twice as high as the chance of preventing a COVID hospitalisation. We're harming 1 in 800 people to supposedly save 1 in 20,000. This is madness. The strongest claims have too often been based on modelling carried out on the basis of flawed assumptions. Where observational studies have been carried out, researchers will correct, for age and comorbidities to make the vaccines look better. However, they never correct for socio-economic or ethnic differences that would make the vaccines look worse. This matters. For example, claims of high mortality in less vaccinated regions in the United States, took no account of the fact that this was the case before the vaccines were rolled out. That is why studies that claim to show the vaccines prevented Covid deaths also showed a marked effect of them preventing non-Covid deaths. The prevention of non-Covid deaths is always a statistical illusion and claims of preventing Covid deaths should not be assumed when that illusion has not been corrected for. And when it is corrected for, the claims of efficacy for the vaccines vanish with it. COVID disproportionately killed people from ethnic minorities and lower socioeconomic groups. During the 2020, during the pandemic, the deaths among the most deprived were up by 23%, compared to 17% for the least deprived. However, since 2022, the pattern has reversed, with 5% excess mortality amongst the most deprived, compared to 7% among the least deprived. These deaths are being caused by something different. In 2020, the excess was highest in the oldest cohorts and there were fewer than expected deaths amongst the younger age groups. But since 2022, the 50 to 64 year old cohort has had the highest excess mortality. Even the youngest age groups are now seeing substantial excess, with a 9% excess in the under 50s since 2022 compared to 5% now in the over 75 group. Despite London being a younger region, the excess in London is only 3%, whereas it is higher in every more heavily vaccinated region of the UK. It should be noted that London is famously the least vaccinated region in the UK by some margin. Studies comparing regions on a larger scale show the same thing. There are studies from the Netherlands, Germany and the whole world each showing that the highest mortality after vaccination was seen in the most heavily vaccinated regions. So we need to ask, what are people dying of? Since 2022, there has been 11% excess in ischemic heart disease deaths and a 16% excess in heart failure deaths. In meantime, cancer deaths, only 1% above expected levels, which is further evidence that it is not simply, some other factor that affects deaths across the board, such as a failing to account for an aging population or a failing NHS. In fact, the excess itself has a seasonality with a peak in the winter months. The fact it returns to baseline levels in summer is a further indication that this is not due to some statistical error or an ageing population alone. Dr Clare Craig from the Heart Group first highlighted a stepwise increase in cardiac arrest calls after the vaccine rollout in May 2021 and Heart have repeatedly raised concerns about the increase in cardiac deaths and they have every reason to be concerned. Four participants in the vaccine group of the Pfizer trial died from cardiac arrest compared to only one in the placebo group. Overall there were 21 deaths in the vaccine group up to March 2021 compared to 17 in the placebo group. And there are serious anomalies about the reporting of the deaths within this trial, with the deaths in the vaccine group taking much longer to report than those in the placebo group. And that's highly suggestive, Mr Deputy Speaker, of a significant bias in what was supposed to be a blinded trial. An Israeli study clearly showed an increase in cardiac hospital attendances, among 18 to 39 year olds that correlated with vaccination, not with COVID. There have now been several postmortem studies demonstrating a causal link between vaccination and coronary artery disease leading to death up to four months after the last dose. And we need to remember that the safety trial was cut short to only two months. So there's no evidence of any vaccine safety beyond that point. The decision to unblind the trials after two months and vaccinate the placebo group is nothing less than a public health scandal. Everyone involved failed in their duty to the truth. But no one cares, Mr Deputy Speaker. The one place that can help us understand exactly what caused this is Australia. Australia had almost no Covid when vaccines were first introduced, making them the perfect control group. The state of South Australia had only a thousand cases of Covid across its whole population by December 2021, before Omicron arrived. What was the impact of vaccination there? For 15 to 44 year olds there was historically 1,300 emergency cardiac presentations a month. With vaccine rollout in the under 50s this rocketed to 2,172 cases in November 2021 in this age group alone, a 67% more than usual. Overall there were 17,900 South Australians who had a cardiac emergency in 2021, compared to only 13,250 in 2018, a 35% increase. It is clearly the vaccine that must be the number one suspect in this and it cannot be dismissed as just a coincidence. Australian mortality overall has increased from early 2021 and the increase is due to cardiac deaths. These excess deaths are not due to an ageing population because there are fewer deaths in the diseases of old age. These deaths are not an effect of COVID because they've happened in places where COVID have not reached and they're not due to low statin prescriptions or under-treated hypertension, as Chris Whitty would suggest, because prescriptions did not change and in any effect would have taken many years and been very small. The prime suspect must be something that was introduced to the population as a whole, something novel. The prime hypothesis must be the experimental COVID-19 vaccines. The ONS published a data set of deaths by vaccinated and unvaccinated. At first glance, it appears to show that the vaccines are safe and effective. However, there were several huge problems with how they presented that data. One was that for the first three-week period after injection, the ONS claimed, there were only a tiny number of deaths. The number the ONS would normally predict to occur in a single week. Where were the deaths from the usual causes? When this was raised, the ONS claimed that the sickest people did not get vaccinated, and therefore people who were taking the vaccination were self-selecting for those least likely to die. Not only is this not the case in the real world, with even hospices heavily vaccinating their residents, but the ONS's own data showed that the proportion of sickest people was equal in the vaccinated and unvaccinated groups. This inevitably raises serious questions about the ONS's data presentation. There were so many problems with the methodology used by the ONS that the Statistics Regulator agreed that the ONS data could not be used to assess vaccine efficacy or safety. That tells you something about the ONS. Consequently, Hart asked the UK Health Security Agency to provide the data they had on people who had died and therefore needed to be removed from their vaccination dataset. This request has been repeatedly refused, with excuses given, including the false claim that anonymising this data will be equivalent to creating it even though there is case law that, anonymization is not considered creation of new data. Mr Deputy Speaker I believe if this data was released it would be damning. That so many lives have been saved by mass vaccination that any amount of harm, suffering and death caused by the vaccines is a price worth paying. They're delusional, Mr Deputy Speaker. The claim of 20 million lives saved is based on now discredited models which assume that Covid waves do not peak without intervention. There have been numerous waves globally that now demonstrate that is not the case, and it was also based on there having been more than half a million lives saved in the UK. That's more than the worst-case scenario predicted at the beginning of the pandemic. For the claim to have been true, the rate at which Covid killed people would have to have taken off dramatically at the beginning of 2021 in the absence of vaccination. This is ludicrous and it bears no relationship to the truth. In the real world, Australia, New Zealand and South Korea had a mortality rate of 400 deaths per million up to the summer of 2022, after they were first hit with Omicron. So how does that compare with the Wuhan strain? France and Europe as a whole had a mortality rate of under 400 deaths per million up to the summer of 2020. Australia, New Zealand and South Korea were all heavily vaccinated before infection. So tell me, where was the benefit? The UK had just over 800 deaths per million up to the summer of 2020. So twice as much. But we know that Omicron is half as deadly as the Wuhan variant. The death rates per million are the same before and after vaccination. So where was the benefits of vaccination? The regulators have failed in their duty to protect the public. They've allowed these novel products to skip crucial safety testing by letting them be described as vaccines. They've failed to insist on safety testing being done in the years since the first temporary emergency authorisation. Even now, no one can tell you how much spike protein is produced on vaccination and for how long. Yet another example of where there is no data for me to share with the House. And when it comes to properly recording deaths due to vaccination, the system's broken. Not a single doctor registered a death from a rare brain clot before doctors in Scandinavia forced the issue and the MHRA acknowledged the problem. Only then did these deaths start to be certified by doctors in the UK. It turns out that doctors were waiting for permission from the regulator and the regulators were waiting to be alerted by the doctors. This is a lethal circularity. Furthermore, coroners have written Regulation 28 reports highlighting deaths from vaccination to prevent further deaths, yet the MHRA said in a response to an FOI that they had not received any of them. The system we have in place is clearly not functioning to protect the public. The regulators also missed the fact that the Pfizer trial, in the Pfizer trial, the vaccine was made for the trial participants in a highly controlled environment, in stark contrast to the manufacturing process used for the public rollout, which was based on a completely different technology. And just over 200 participants were given the same product that was given to the public. But not only was the data from these people never compared to those in the trial for efficacy and safety, But the MHRA have admitted that they dropped the requirement to provide the data. That means there was never a trial on the Pfizer product that was actually rolled out to the public. And that product has never been compared to the product that was actually trialled. The vaccine mass production processes use vats of Escherichia coli and present a risk of contamination with DNA from the bacteria as well as bacterial cell walls which can, cause dangerous reactions. This is not theoretical, Mr Deputy Speaker, this is now sound evidence that has been replicated by several labs across the world, and the mRNA vaccines were contaminated by DNA which far exceeded the usual permissible levels. Given that this DNA is enclosed in the lipid nanoparticle delivery system, it is arguable that even the permissible levels have been far too high. These lipid nanoparticles are known to enter every organ of the body, as well as this potentially causing some of the acute adverse reactions seen, there is a serious risk that this foreign bacterial DNA is inserting itself into human DNA. Will anybody investigate? No, they won't. I'll give way on that point.  (Danny Kruger MP) I am conscious that time is tight. I recognise that the hon. Gentleman is making a very powerful case. Does he agree that the Government should be looking at this properly and should commission of review into the excess deaths, partly so that we can reassure our constituents that the case he's making is not in fact valid and that the vaccines have no cause behind these excess deaths. (Andrew Bridgen MP) I thank the Honourable Gentleman for his support on this topic and of course that is what exactly any responsible government should do. I wrote to the Prime Minister on the 7th August 2023 with all the evidence of this but sadly Mr Deputy Speaker I still await a response. What will it take to stop these products? Their complete failure to stop infection was not enough and we all know plenty of vaccinated people who have caught and spread Covid. The, mutation of the virus to a weaker variant, Omicron, that wasn't enough. The increasing evidence of the serious harms to those of us that were vaccinated. That's not enough. And now the cardiac deaths and the deaths of young people is apparently not enough either. It's high time these experimental vaccines were suspended and a full investigation into the harms they've caused initiated. History will be a harsh judge if we don't start using evidence-based medicine. We need to return to basic science, basic ethics immediately, which means listening to all voices and investigating all concerns. In conclusion, Mr Deputy Speaker, the experimental Covid-19 vaccines are not safe and they're not effective. Despite there only being limited interest in the chamber from colleagues, and I'm very grateful for those who have attended, we can see from the public gallery there is considerable public interest. I would implore all members of the House, present and those not. Support calls for a three-hour debate on this important issue. And Mr Deputy Speaker, this might be the first debate on excess deaths in our Parliament. Indeed, it might be the first debate on excess deaths in the world, but very sadly I promise you won't be the last. (Parliament Square Speech Andrew Bridgen MP) But without further ado let's welcome to the stage Mr Andrew Bridgen. Thank you ladies and gentlemen, thank you for coming down here to support the debate today, and thank you for supporting me and the cause. More? I just spoke for 25 minutes. Blood. It's been quite a week. Start of the week, get attacked from behind by a blunt instrument. But what an ending to this week. We have made history today. Nine months, more than 20 refused attempts to get a debate on excess deaths, the first debate on excess deaths in the UK, Parliament, the first proper debate on excess deaths in the world and I promise you, I absolutely promise you, it won't be the last. We will get a three hour debate in the next few weeks now on excess deaths. We've got two democracies under challenge all over the world. We're hanging over and using what we've got to make sure we get our message out there. On Tuesday next week I'm, I'm bringing in a bill, a ten minute rule motion, a bill called the Sovereignty and Referendums Bill. I'm going to put it to the House. That would stop, if we could bring that in, that would stop the WHO power grab of the people of the UK. I've been invited to speak as well next week on Zoom to some African political leaders, to try and persuade them to resist the WHO power grab, because it doesn't matter where we break this, we can break it in the UK, we can break it anywhere else in the world. This is a worldwide problem, an absolute assault on humanity, and we've all got to stick together. I've been an MP for nearly 14 years. I've given a lot of speeches in that chamber. That I was a bit nervous today because I knew there was never going to be a more important, speech I've ever given. I've never been in a more important speech than the one I was giving today. Can't you hear at the back? Turn up the PA. So, here we go. There was never going to be a more important speech than the one I was giving today, and, even after 14 years as an MP I was a little bit nervous standing up. But what really got me was, OK, there wasn't as many MPs in the chamber as I'd liked, but, the public gallery was full and the support from there was absolutely incredible. And they always say the politicians, that place over there, is in the Westminster bubble. We are going to burst the bubble in Westminster. Absolutely. Ultimately, my message to send you away with is that your determination, your cheerfulness, your resilience will deliver us victory. Thank you very much for coming today. (Hearts of Oak) Andrew, we've just been in on the debate on vaccine harms. Tell us about the process, because it's been a long, hard battle, which you talk about in the chamber. (Andrew Bridgen MP) Yeah, I've been putting in since January every week for a backbench business debate. That was refused. I've put in for a Westminster Hall debate on a weekly basis and I've put in for an adjournment debate. Eventually, after nine months and more than 20 rejections, we had the first debate on excess deaths in the UK Parliament. I think it's the first one in the world, but I promise you it won't be the last. I think the dozen or so MPs who attended today's debate, I'm hoping I'll be able to get a get them to sign up that we can have a three-hour debate well before Christmas and then it's going to grow from there because ultimately the data that I imparted in the chamber today, it's all backed up with the science. Every MP is going to be getting a copy of my Hansard speech and the full data pack of all the evidence that backs up everything I've said. There's no excuses now. So this goes to law because it's a no-brainer really to have these conversations because we've all seen excess deaths across Europe. Ask yourself in a democracy why don't they want to have a conversation about anything? I mean, I'm aware that in the Australian Senate four or five senators asked for a debate on excess deaths they ended up having a debate on whether you should have a debate on excess deaths and the consensus of the Australian Senate was they didn't want to have a debate on excess deaths. Well, I mean that's a red flag straight away, isn't it? (Hearts of Oak) Last question, I assume you believe that there are some MPs that can be won over, that public figures have kept quiet a further reputation, which you don't care about and you've walked away from the party. Tell us about those who you think you can possibly win over and then support you publicly on this. (Andrew Bridgen MP) Well certainly some of the ones that were there today, I know of some who weren't there today who will support calling for a much bigger debate on excess deaths. And ultimately it's the pressure of the electorate, the people, and you could see that although the House wasn't very full of members, the public gallery was full and that shows you that public opinion is they want this issue debated, they want to know what's gone on, and it's their right to have it happen. And that will become an irresistible force for politicians. That's how democracy works. (Hearts of Oak) Well, we've just had the debate in Parliament, a debate that I actually, to be honest, didn't think would happen. I thought that it would be stopped and held off. Only one member of 650 MPs in that place was willing to stand up and have this conversation, on vaccine arms as on excess deaths. He spoke for 24 minutes, presented everything in a measured calm manner, no emotion. One of the many things Andrew is great at, that he just lays it out gently, softly, step by step, that he doesn't raise the hyperball that maybe some others will rise to. And he laid it out in 24 minutes. And of course, the government's response is, Well, excess deaths are other factors, lifestyle factors, like smoking, like cholesterol, even fatty foods. So the government are blaming all the excess deaths over a period of a sudden spike in, smoking and a spike in eating fish and chips. That's what the government. Wow. Like ostriches with their heads in the sand. So Andrew presented his figures. The great thing is that we expect now there to be a much longer debate in Parliament. That was a short motion, a short debate, a 30 minute session. Andrew is hopeful that this can now go to a three hour fuller debate and that will be really interesting to see whether that gets tabled and whether it actually does go ahead and I would like to see other MPs backing Andrew and I think the more he speaks the more courage they will get. Andrew is someone with courage, with conviction, with a backbone, with a determination to speak truth and often, that is a rarity across there, it really is, really people want to, keep their heads down, they want to climb up the greasy pole and attain those higher levels of political achievement. So we obviously will watch this, follow Andrew. He is a hero. There's no one else in that Parliament across the way that's a hero like Andrew. And what else? I mean, it's the hill that he's chosen to die on. It's the hill that he has chosen to fight on. It's the hill that he has lost his career in the Conservative Party. And why? Because people are dying and no one is talking about it. What more important issue is there apart from life and death? And if something has been introduced and it's killing people, you need to look at it, you need to address, you need to understand it, to analyse it and then see what you do with that. So we have won here amongst 650. We will follow this and watch this closely as we see this move towards a fuller debate in Parliament and certainly my hope and prayer is that many other MPs stand up and speak, and that this happens across the world. We've seen a debate happening, I know, in the German Parliament with the AfD. I know we've seen debates happening in the Australian Parliament and the One Nation Party with Pauline and Malcolm are doing a fantastic job there. And here is one individual. Obviously, the Reclaim Party is behind Andrew Bridgen. He's a member of that of Lawrence Fox's party. And Andrew will continue to speak. And as he speaks, I believe that we will see ripple effects across the world because the world watches what happens here. This is called the mother of parliament and I believe that as Andrew continues to speak and continues to speak within this chamber that we will see other parliaments around the world address this issue. But this doesn't affect future debt, I mean, the damage is done, the deaths are happening. But at least you have to hold people to account. And for me, this is about justice. It's about honesty. It's about clarity. It is about truth, which is something that's been in short supply over the last couple of years during the COVID tyranny. So keep an eye on this space for Andrew to continue to push this. And when that longer three hour debate does happen, we will be here reporting on us and reporting on those who have come out to support Andrew today. Matt Le Tissier was here, Le God was in the chamber watching Andrew, Mike Yeadon was here speaking, Fiona Hine has done a great job in pulling people together. There is massive support and I think the parliamentarians in the government want individuals like Andrew Bridgton to feel they are alone, but they are not alone. They are backed by masses of the population and today was a small subset, of that, but Andrew knows he is not alone. Make sure and post this video, let others see what has happened here in the UK Parliament and have hope, because I think often that's also in short supply and I think what has happened today is a day of hope, is a day of reckoning and is a day of moving forward to actually presenting the truth and holding people to account.

On today's show, we delve into Valentina's perspective on the October 13th headline from The Guardian, which advocates for the IMF to allocate $300 billion annually to assist poor countries in combating the climate crisis, according to Joseph Stiglitz. Following that, we shift our focus to the BBC's admission of misleading the public concerning pro-Palestine protests across the UK. In a candid conversation, Lembit and Neil explore the issue of BBC bias, with Neil drawing from his personal experiences. He will shed light on his views regarding the shortcomings of the public broadcaster in delivering the news. GUEST 1 OVERVIEW: Prof. Valentina Zharkova. PhD is the Director of ZVS Research Enterprise Ltd.​ She is also Emerita Prof. of Mathematics​ at the Department of Mathematics, Physics and Electrical Engineering​ at Northumbria University​ in Newcastle upon Tyne​. Valentina obtained her PhD in Astrophysics ​ with a thesis concerning ‘Radiative transfer of solar prominences' ​conducting research at the Main Astronomical Observatory, Kiev, Ukraine. ​Valentina is currently one of the foremost solar researchers in Great Britain and the world at large and discovered sunquakes induced by flaring processes, publishing a paper ​on the topic in Nature, 1998 with wide media coverage. ​ She's published more th​an 200 papers​ including ​her study predicting the modern Grand Solar Minimum (2020-2053).​. She has received a SOHO/MDO team award for discovery of sunquake (1999), RHESSI award for outstanding research (2005), NSF US award for advanced studies of solar flares (2002). GUEST 2 OVERVIEW: Neil Liversidge is an Independent Financial Adviser who has worked in the sector since 1980. He runs his own business, West Riding Personal Financial Solutions Ltd in Castleford, West Yorkshire, which he founded in 2004, managing close-on £100m in assets. Neil was National Chairman of The Motorcycle Action Group, a bikers' lobby group, from 1989 to 2002, and in 1998 founded FEMA, the Federation of European Motorcyclists' Associations. Neil was re-elected MAG National Chairman again in 2021 and founded Transport Reality to campaign against the UK Government's proposed ban on fossil-fuelled private transport. Neil is an extensively published writer and describes himself as “100% a Brexiteer.” In broadcasting, Neil has worked with the BBC for many years, contributing to programs on political, financial and motorcycling issues. Neil's main leisure interests are motorcycling, history, music, movies, and DIY.

Show notes and Transcript Andrew Bridgen MP is one of those rare individuals in UK politics.  He is driven by convictions and critical thinking as opposed to fame and power which is the norm in Westminster (or on Capital Hill I assume).  He was an absolute Brexiteer and led part of that campaign for The UK to have freedom from the EU.  He joins Hearts of Oak to discuss how he fought for Brexit all through his political life, but his biggest battle has been against the Covid Tyranny imposed on us by the UK government.  Andrew spoke up for all who have been vaccine injured and for that he was thrown out of the Conservative party and vilified in the media.  But the Conservatives loss was the gain of The Reclaim Party as he now represents them as the MP for North West Leicestershire. His bravery and boldness is plain for all to see and as long as we have people like Andrew Bridgen in Parliament, we have a glimmer of hope in the UK. Andrew Bridgen was elected in 2010 after spending 25 years running his successful family business, AB Produce, based in the constituency at Measham. Prior to this Andrew attended local state schools and Nottingham University. He has also trained as an officer in the Royal Marines. During his time in Parliament, Andrew has been a prolific speaker and has campaigned on a variety of local and national issues in Parliament. Locally Andrew campaigned for grant funding to bring all of NW Leics District Council housing up to the Decent Homes Standards. Andrew has also campaigned for better transport infrastructure which led to the duelling of the A453 and the planned electrification of the midland mainline. He has also worked with business and community groups to bring down the rate of unemployment in the District, as well as holding a jobs fair. On a national level, Andrew led the successful campaigns to decriminalise non-payment of the TV Licence and to scrap Air Passenger Duty for Children. He has also used his business experience to serve on the Regulatory Reform Committee as well as the Deregulation and the Enterprise Bill committee. Connect with Andrew... X: https://x.com/ABridgen?s=20 The Reclaim Party: https://www.reclaimparty.co.uk/andrew-bridgen Interview recorded 22.9.23 *Special thanks to Bosch Fawstin for recording our intro/outro on this podcast. Check out his art https://theboschfawstinstore.blogspot.com/ and follow him on GETTR https://gettr.com/user/BoschFawstin and Twitter https://twitter.com/TheBoschFawstin?s=20  To sign up for our weekly email, find our social media, podcasts, video, livestreaming platforms and more... https://heartsofoak.org/connect/ Support Hearts of Oak by purchasing one of our fancy T-Shirts.... https://heartsofoak.org/shop/ Please subscribe, like and share! Transcript (Hearts of Oak) Andrew Bridgen, it is wonderful to speak to you today. Thank you so much for your time. (Andrew Bridgen MP) Yeah, you're welcome.  Andrew Bridgen, of course you can find him @ABridgen on Twitter and he has served as Member of Parliament for North West Leicestershire since 2010, re-elected 2015, 2017 and 2019 with a whopping 62% off the vote, one of the few MPs with anywhere near that. Obviously, thrown out of the Conservative Party, the whip removed, and then that was in April 2023 for raising concerns on the Covid jab, and Andrew now represents the Reclaim Party in Parliament as an MP. Andrew, may I ask you first, what got you into politics? You entered Parliament in 2010. What made you think it would be a good idea to get into politics? Frustration, Peter, and I've been running a business for 22 years, which would start it up the thousand pounds. So I've been I've been MD and chairman of the company and we built it up to 25 million turnover company employing 300 people by 2006. And I'd give, I'd been interested in politics. I joined the Conservatives in 1983 at Nottingham University. And I'd been chairman of the Institute of Directors and on the council of the IOD in Pall Mall, and through working during the Blair years with the East Midlands Regional Assembly as a business member. Obviously I'd met a lot of ministers and I can't say that I was impressed. Well, it was pretty clear they were going to bankrupt us. So a group of friends, most, they were all really sort of small and medium-sized business people and their wives, we used to meet in a pub locally and every Friday night it was sort of a groundhog day, so they always moaned about the state of the country. I'd given a reasonable donation to the Conservative Party in 2005 and I think we had a half a percent swing to the Conservatives so worked out at that rate we're never going to get rid of Tony Blair. And so they moaned every Friday night and it eventually it got to me but I mean by that time I was running a business that was making about three million pounds a year across the group. I've got a good management team and no debt whatsoever and one pint of Marston's Pedigree on a Friday night too many and I said to this group of collected individuals, that's it then. It's no good relying on anybody else. There's only us. So in North West Leicestershire was supposed to be a rock solid Labour seat. The council I don't think had ever been conservative controlled properly. I think they may have had control for about three months once out of 40 years after a by-election. So I said well you all stand for the council, the district council, I'll stand for MP, we'll take over and we'll get it sorted and to a man and a woman every single one of them agreed. And so I put most of the money up for the, I put the money up for the campaign and I got the nomination. Nobody really wanted to be the MP for North West Leicestershire, well the candidate for North West Leicestershire because no one, the Conservatives told me we can't win North West Leicestershire, 83rd target seat. They also said they weren't giving me any money but I said that's fine, I've got my own money and my factory was in the, in the, so I actually did have a payroll vote. So 300 people plus their families in the constituency and the District Council elections came round first in 2007 and I was already selected as the parliamentary candidate. I ran those elections and put the money up and it was the first time the Conservatives had put a full slate up in the seat and they said I was running them too thin but I always thought basically if you didn't put a candidate up at an election it's very difficult to see how how they're going to vote for somebody aren't they? So we put a full slate of candidates up and took Labour down to five councils out of 38 in one night, the biggest swing in the country in the District Council elections in 2007. We took control of the council obviously, and I had the second biggest swing in against Labour in 2010, so I turned a rock-solid four and a half thousand Labour majority with a much loved Labour MP, who sadly died, into seven and a half thousand Conservatives at one, so that's like a 12.5% swing. The seat's my home and, you know, I'm very comfortable in North West Leicestershire. And we moved it to, in 2015, it went up to 11,200 majority. And despite Theresa May's best efforts in 17 with her manifesto, which was appalling, I moved it up to 13,300 majority. Then in 19, I led the leave campaign in the referendum for the East Midlands. I told my seat that if they didn't back me I would have to resign as their MP because we didn't agree on the big issues but to be honest Peter I was fairly sure they would. So the East Midlands voted 59-41 to leave and my own seat voted 61 39 and I'm actually the MP who persuaded Boris Johnson to back leave. He was no way that he was a natural Brexiteer and also if you look back on YouTube you'll find that on the eve of the referendum Boris Johnson came to my seat and we went round Ashby de la Zouch. That's when I told him we were going to win and you should have seen his face when I told him we were going to win. I don't think that that wasn't actually part of the plan Peter and in fact he tried to talk me out of it he said no no it's going to be close but we're not going to win. I said no no we're going to win tomorrow. No, it's going to be close. I said, well, maybe I said, but certainly not around here, not around here. It's not going to be close. You know, the bit we're running. So, and then in 19, on the get Brexit done election, which now seems so much happened since 19. It feels like a very long time ago, more than four years away. And I got a 20,400 majority, it was 62.8% of the vote. And the BBC, I had no sleep that night, the next morning the BBC interviewed me and they said, Mr Bridgen, you must be delighted, this is your fourth election victory, each time you've increased your vote, you've increased your majority, your percentage of the vote, you must be delighted. I said, no, it's terrible actually. They said, why is it terrible? I said, well, I've, you know, it's nine years since I was first elected as the MP, I've delivered the highest economic growth in the country. We've taken the poorest constituency in Leicestershire and made it the richest, the only part of Leicestershire with above-average UK salaries and wages. We've got the happiest place to live in the Midlands now, Colville, which was the most deprived town in Leicestershire. I said one in three of the electorate are still not voting for me. I'm gonna have to work much much harder.  Tell me about that whole Brexit battle. I mean my time was UKIP and UKIP was easy because 100% of Kippers were on board. The Conservative Party have always had that tension and division over Europe. What was that like actually in the Conservative Party pushing something that wasn't necessarily what the Conservatives wanted?  Well it wasn't what the establishment wanted, all the established parties were backing Remain. I think it was interesting that the Conservative Party was like, a very civilized internal war, and there were probably only a quarter to 30 percent of conservative MPs who were for leave, so still the majority were, remain, or indifferent, and some of them maintaining indifference, which I mean, I don't know what you're into politics for. If a big question like whether we should remain or leave the European Union, they say, I don't want to get involved in this. I'll just sit down and see what my people say. I mean, that's not exactly leadership, is it? I mean, I think that should be pretty much automatic deselection, if you can't make your mind up on that sort of issue. And what comes back to mind is that the Conservative Party, we used to, when I was in the Conservative Party, before they threw me out, well, first I'll tell you this, Conservatives have never been encouraged in the Conservative Party, they're only ever tolerated. And the Conservative Party, Parliamentary Party, had something called an away day every two years, and they pay for them in advance to get a good deal. So despite the fact that there was this internal schism over the referendum that was coming, the party had paid for an away weekend in Oxfordshire at this basically hotel that's like a Bond villain's hideout, with an underground lecture theatre, which is a very weird place, and because we paid for it, we were told we'd all got to go there, and this is only sort of three months before the referendum, and we had a very civilised weekend of talking about policy, but no one mentioned the EU and no one mentioned the referendum over the whole two and a half days and the dinner, but I do remember that Craig Oliver sat with me at the final dinner he sat next to me on my table at the final dinner and I told him, I said have you got yourself another job lined up for when you lose, and he said to me he said that's fine he said if we win by one vote that's it settled and that's that's it done. I said well I'll be honest I'll take though I'll take that on as as it cuts both ways, you know, if we win by one. And I knew we were going to win, Peter, because, I'd been around the East Midlands and I could tell we were definitely going to win. But it's about driving the vote up because it wasn't just winning by a seat, all the votes were cumulative, so every vote counted. And what I'd sussed out is in my seat and in the East Midlands is that people who didn't normally vote were going to come out and vote. They weren't, those people who didn't normally engage with politics, they weren't coming out to, they weren't coming out to vote for the status quo, they were voting for change. So I concentrated my campaigning efforts the last six weeks. And did a lot of campaigning and also I was running a load of field operatives who were, 90% of it, they were UKIP. The Remain campaign had nobody on the ground willing to deliver leaflets, hardly at all, for them. We were destroying them on the ground battle. Obviously, in the air campaign we could only be responsive because they got all the media, they got all the established parties, and we were the insurgents. So that was more of a struggle, but on the ground we were doing very, very well. And what I'd sussed out was that people were going to come out and vote who didn't normally vote and every time I saw the polls I was not disappointed because I knew that we were probably, we probably got five or six percent better than the polls were saying because these people who were going to come out and vote and they told me they were and I believe they were, They're not engaged in politics, they're not on YouGov's polling panel, and when Com Res or somebody else rang them up and they said, oh, I'm going to vote to leave the European Union, they'd say, well, did you vote in the last general election? No. Did you vote in the local? No. Did you vote in the one before? No. Have you ever voted? No. And they'd put them down as zero chance of voting. Well, I knew as long as we got those people out, it was all going to come as a bit of a surprise to the Remain campaign. In North West Leicestershire, and we counted our votes, so I know it's fine, I know exactly what the vote was in North West Leicestershire, but you could terminate my seat of North West Leicestershire until the next boundary changes. I think it was a sort of 70-75% turnout to get me in in 2010, important election. And then ever since then, as my majority had gone up, the turnout had gone down and it dropped to sort of 68.5% or something in 19. But I mean, it was a stonking massive majority. And obviously the referendum, I was very encouraged when it was nearly 80%. And I'd spent all my time in Northwest Leicestershire and across the East Midlands. In my villages, I mean, it's a general election, they turn out 85 percent anyway. I'm not going to squeeze much more out of those people. You know, it's very hard to squeeze that they're on the second, third pressings of the pips. So I went to all the areas that normally turn out 50, 55, 60 percent because there was plenty of low-hanging fruit and you know it was that turnout in North West Leicestershire and across the East Midlands some people who didn't normally vote and that's why we won and that's why the polling was so wrong and that's what people like David Cameron who'd come to my seat in 2008 when he was leader of the opposition and he really upset me Peter so I'm a a candidate. We've just taken the council with the biggest swing in the country for the first time in living memory and Cameron told me in front of constituents that my seat was a dump and it should never be conservative. And they weren't giving me any money and I said I don't need your money and to be honest David if that's your view, never ever come to my constituency again and I will with it. And to be honest, David Cameron is a man of his word, he never came, he never came again. So that's fine. And I think now my majority is bigger than Whitney, so I mean what a dump the Cotswolds must be. North West Leicestershire. And we've gentrified. So people used to say Coalville was a very poor place and it didn't have a chance and now it's Coalville and proud. In fact I'm speaking to you from Coalville today.  I want to get on to the COVID discussion situation, but just you, you talked at the beginning about having a business and I guess part of your reason for getting into politics was you wanted the government to butt out, you want local businesses to be able to get on, to have, not to have restrictions on them actually doing well, making money, employing people. What kind of other kind of interests or passions? Well, I've actually cut my teeth in politics when I was chair of the Institute of Directors, which they didn't like particularly because they were fairly pro-EU, is that I got involved as a businessman in the,business for sterling in the no campaign to keep the pound so 25 years ago and thank goodness we didn't join the euro otherwise I mean it'd be much much more difficult to extract ourselves. Yes and Simon Wolfson the chairman of Next we used to meet at Enderby in his boardroom and plot business for Sterling in the No campaign. So I suppose that's where I got involved. And a chap called Chris Eaton Harris, who's gone on to great things, apparently, he was an MEP. And his father had a fruit and vegetable wholesale pitch in Covent Garden Market. And since I was into washing, packing, and distributing vegetables, mostly potatoes, nothing sexy. Chris was one of my customers. I used to buy from Mark Potatoes from Mark Spencer. And Philip Dunn as well. They're farmers. So we had the whole supply chain between us, do you know what I mean? But I made most of the money.  Which is just as well because they're not in parliament. Just as well. So yeah, I wanted to put something back and yeah, that's where we ended up. Obviously being a Brexiteer, there was backlash in the media, there was probably some pushback within the party itself. But I guess none of that even prepared you for the backlash whenever you addressed COVID tyranny. Is that a fair assessment?  Well I know that the two years under Theresa May were purgatory quite honestly. I mean I was a Spartan so I voted three times against Theresa May's deal which you know it wasn't, you know, some colleagues were conflicted and there was Steve Baker crying his eyes out. Well I mean there's nothing to cry about because I've already voted against it twice, it hasn't got any better and once you've come to the conclusion, which was the correct conclusion, that Theresa May's deal was constitutionally and democratically worse than being in the European Union. I mean at least if you're in the European Union you have a chance of leaving whereas Theresa May's deal we would be in vassalage forever and there's no way of leaving. Well I mean that's not a deal, not in my name and that vote on the third time Theresa May's deal came up before the Commons I was pretty convinced that there were probably going to be 28 Conservatives in the no lobby. The rest of Parliament would vote yes and that we would have been slung out of the Conservative Party within a few days. That was where I thought we were. Thank goodness. I mean we always criticise Jeremy Corbyn but he is a man of principle and he is secretly a Brexiteer really I think and he marched the Labour Party in behind us and the rest, as they say, is history. But I mean, a politically savvy Keir Starmer would never, would have taken Theresa May's deal and consigned us to EU vassalage. So thank goodness it was Jeremy Corbyn. But he did win the Conservatives the 19th election. That wasn't, down to Boris, it was pure fear of Jeremy Corbyn.  Yeah, no, it was, you don't want Corbyn, 100% I remember that well.  Well, I actually had two, during that 19 election, I can remember when I was going around the doorsteps, two members, two paid-up locally members of the Labour Party came to me and said I'll be voting Conservative, I can't vote for Jeremy Corbyn.  And they actually told me they were paid up members of the Labour Party locally. Well I mean if you, I mean that is your core, ultra core vote. They weren't even voting for him. Wow. On to the COVID. I've never seen anything and I mean I've loved politics, forever with Northern Ireland parties, the DUP and we've had Ian Paisley and Sammy Wilson on before and then conservatives then over to UKIP, but nothing has divided people like what we've had in the last three years with the COVID tyranny. But you spoke a step, it wasn't just on the restrictions that we had, that civil liberty, but you also saw what was happening with harms and went on that. Tell us about that, how you worked that out, because that was a big step and that was an unacceptable step.  I think there's an element of destiny about all of this Peter. When I was 18 and I'm the only member of my family that's been to university, I had a foreground because my parents weren't very wealthy, they were poor. So about two and a half percent of people went to University when I went in the 80s and I went to Nottingham locally but I studied biological sciences with biochemistry specializing in genetics, virology and behaviour. Oh dear! And I don't know why, just they were things I found quite fascinating so I've tried to keep my knowledge up so I mean in February when we'd had the 19 election and then we had a sort of six weeks period and then we had then we had COVID and everything changed. Well in the February I was sent and I looked through the scientific papers for the efficacy of hydroxychloroquine, its effectiveness against coronaviruses and it was compelling. They were scientific papers and because I've got, my degree a very long time ago in those subjects I mean I can read them and I can understand the papers and I sent the papers to Mark Spencer, Chief Whip, and said the government need to look at this urgently, this could be could be very useful and also sent them to Jeremy Hunt who was at the time, Chair of the Health Select Committee, and I didn't get anything back from Spencer. And I also told Spencer, I said, you realise that I've got qualifications in all the areas that'll be useful, if you want some help in the number 10, with someone who can actually read the papers and understand it and put it across politically, I'll be quite happy to help. They never, Mr Stewart never asked me to help, and I rang up Jeremy Hunt a week later, and this shocked me, Peter and it will shock your listeners. So I rang him Hunt up and said Jeremy I sent you these papers, have you have you looked at them? And he said Andrew he said don't send me scientific papers he said I don't understand them and I said but Jeremy you're chairman of the health select committee and you were health secretary for seven years. I said what? You don't understand scientific papers, and what you have no access to anyone who does understand them he could actually explain them to you and he put the phone down and that was it and so my suspicion, so I hadn't got a great deal of confidence I did support the first lockdown because I don't think anybody knew, well somebody knew what was going on it certainly wasn't me, you know was it three weeks to flatten the curve. Anyway, so, and I was, from then on, things just didn't seem to stack up. The masks, I couldn't see the sense behind the masks. I mean, those paper masks, they are to stop saliva from the doctors and nurses going on to the patient's wounds and to stop blood and other bodily fluids squirting into the medic's mouths, which they don't really like, they don't like that. That's what they're there for. So not to stop viruses and the gaps around the edges And I was briefly in the military. And if you had a full nuclear biological chemical suit, you've only got an 80% chance of keeping a virus out. Well, I mean, that's not what these paper masks are. And I guess, I hated putting them on anyway. They're horrible. So I was on that. And then the continuous lockdowns, and Northwest Leicestershire was chucked in with Leicester. And so we were locked down as much as anywhere in the country. It was completely unprecedented and unwarranted. I also really objected to the schools being closed. And I objected. I mean, they were making the children wear masks. And even some schools were making the children wear masks when it wasn't mandated. And none of this seemed right. And there are some, speaking to some scientists who were speaking out about their concerns, And the fact that they were silenced, and they said all the science is all settled, I mean we've heard that one before several times, I'm sure we'll hear it again, but I mean science is never settled. It's a bit like politics, there's always another view, and if you can't defend your position, then there's something wrong. You know, every scientific thesis is open to challenge, or should be able to challenge, and most of them, I mean half of everything that doctors are taught in medical school within 10 years will be proved to be completely wrong. That's a fact, I mean that's just a fact. So, you know, the only constant is the evolution of science and new theories to supersede old ones and saying that, you know, we're not having any debate about this and cancelling eminent scientists. Then my concerns grew and grew and grew but I didn't want to believe the worst of the government. I actually am double vaccinated. They will call me an anti-vaxxer so which is difficult when I'm vaxxed. I'm more the sort of concerned vaxxed and I had two shots of AstraZeneca, I wish I had none, and I had a bad reaction after the second jab, which really, really hurt me. So I'd bitten my tongue, that also uncovered a lot of corruption around PPE. My whistle-blower was sacked. We uncovered £860 million worth of PCR tests that had disappeared from stock at Kuehne & Nagel were the distributor. We traced some of the unique barcodes and they turned up in Berlin. They'd been resold. So nearly a billion pounds. And my whistle-blower could only go back 12 months on his computer. And he was only in one of the three channels. He was in the channel to do with bulk. So it was only sort of prisons, schools, hospitals, things like that. But 860 million pounds worth of PCR tests had gone missing the taxpayer paid for. We took it to the government and the civil service. My whistle-blowers computer was switched off on the day and he was sacked within seven days, no investigation. I was pretty annoyed. And I mean, the corruption of the Boris Johnson regime was the first one I'd, and he was the he'd been the first Prime Minister I'd actually voted for and I was feeling very betrayed. So I hadn't voted for David Cameron, obviously, I voted for David Davies, and Cameron got in and I didn't vote for Theresa May. She got in. And so then Boris turned out to be as crooked as all the rest of them. So that wasn't good. And then my pretty view on the vaccines and the mRNA technology, the messenger ribonucleic acid technology. I was working behind the scenes and obviously Matt Hancock had to go and we had, Sajid Javid became health secretary. But there are about five Conservative MPs who are qualified doctors. Well Matt Hancock, not a good man, but he had said in the House of Commons that these vaccines were for adults, they weren't for children, so no one under 18 was going to have them. I know that every one of the doctors, qualified doctors, went to see Sajid Javid and told him not to use the experimental vaccines on under-18s and he listened to all of them and then approved it. It's interesting that these two health secretaries are both leaving the Commons at the next election, isn't it? I wonder where they'll land, you know what I mean? I suspect Peter, there'll be earning a lot more money than MPs get paid, let's just put it that way.  And then when the MHRA came out in November last year and wanted to extend the experimental vaccines to babies, down to six months of age, and I'll declare an interest, I've got a five-year-old and I thought now, I've got to speak out and I knew there'd be a huge backlash from the party, politically and I knew the vested interests that were involved in it but I also knew that it was probably going to cost me my position in the Conservative Party because they were so committed, but that I could win, that I'm pretty sure I thought, well there's no point doing it for nothing, you've got to win and I was pretty sure that I could put the science over that there were no healthy child of that age had died anywhere in the world of COVID-19 so there was minimal, minuscule risk from the virus but there was a risk from the vaccine. I thought even the most pro-vaccine person I could persuade that since the manufacturers still had immunity from prosecution that there had to be a risk. But there was no risk for those children. I thought I could get that message across and we could actually do some good and so I'd spoken out in a Westminster Hall debate, in I think it was October and then on November 13th I secured an adjournment debate and and blew the lid off the childhood vaccines, vaccination with the experimental mRNA. And that night, my life changed. I was basically immediately cancelled by the mainstream media. And from that moment onwards, I had hundreds of thousands of emails from around the world from people who were telling me about the vaccine harms and the vaccine deaths that they were seeing and that was it really. So after that, although the government will say that I'm a conspiracy theorist and anti-science, anti-vax, and all the people who call me anti-science and everything, I mean they haven't got any science degrees between them and the fact is that the government, our government was never able to approve those vaccines for healthy under fives, whereas all the other countries around the world did. So despite the fact that they said that I was talking absolute rubbish, they never bought the policy and every other country did. And then we got round to sort of January and the infamous tweet, which was actually, I mean, yes, so I retweeted, I actually didn't do it, but it was retweeted on my Twitter, a tweet from Dr. Josh Guetzkow of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and it's fair to say that Mr. Guetzkow is a Jewish gentleman, that he'd been told by a top cardiologist that the rollout of the vaccine was the biggest crime against humanity since the Holocaust, and the party seized on that, the Conservative Party seized on that, to say I was an anti-Semite, and suspended me immediately from the party. I had a meeting at that time with a Conservative Party grandee who'd clearly been briefed by the party. We had an hour together in his office and I told him all of my concerns around the vaccine harms, the midazolam and morphine, the creation of the first wave of deaths by moving people out of care homes and then putting them onto the death pathway, putting them down, treating them with respiratory suppressants to give them the symptoms of COVID-19 which will appear on their on their death certificate and they were pretty much all cremated very shortly afterwards so there was no autopsies and we had an hour of that. I also knew that the person I was meeting with, because I'd done my research and I've got plenty of informers, he knew full well all of my concerns because he'd been told them. I also know that his sister had had to go into hospital after the second Pfizer jab with chest pains, but I didn't tell him any of this. And at the end of the meeting this grandee turned around to me, obviously with the party line, I've been suspended and said that there is currently no political appetite for your views on the vaccine, Andrew. They may well be in 20 years time and you're probably going to be proved right but in the meantime you need to bear in mind you're taking on the most powerful vested interest in the world with all the personal risk for you which that will entail, and at that point I said well the meeting's over then isn't it? I'm not, don't ever threaten me and I don't like being threatened by public school boys. You know, as a comprehensive school boy, if they had been at my school, they'd have spent most of their time with their head down the toilet. It was a very comprehensive education.  So we basically called it a day at that and then they just fast-tracked the investigation and found me guilty and permanently expelled me from the Conservative Party, which is interesting because in their investigation what they didn't discover is I never put the tweet out myself anyway. I've never ever had the codes to my own Twitter. It was actually posted by my association chairman who remains in the Conservative Party.  Can I ask you about... I need to ask you about the conversations with colleagues and obviously not breaking confidentiality of that, but working with Lord Pearson I'm always amazed people come to him after a debate and says well done. I could never say that but well done you said that. Did you have any kind of similar?  Yes, it's coming up to a year since I first spoke out so yeah I've probably had 20, I probably had 30 backbenchers have come up to me and said you're definitely onto something with these vaccine harms, keep going but that's a million miles from standing in the chamber and saying anything. I've had senior members of the Conservative Party have come to me and said that they're going to speak out. I've had a very senior MP came to me before summer recess and said he'd been approached by a constituent representing 1,100 vaccine-harmed people and he'd have to speak out, but he hasn't, and I had a very senior minister who came to me and said that they're, I mean this is all in private in parliament, no witnesses, so I mean they can deny it if they want to, but you have my word it's the truth, and come to me and said you do realize that my sister's just taken the Moderna booster and now she's paralyzed from the neck down. And I said well that's that's that's terrible news but clearly you're going to have to speak out now aren't you? and they said no, well she doesn't want any publicity and they think they're going to get her to walk again. I said well you don't have to name names I mean you know, you've got to speak out you know and the minister said I'm not speaking out and walked off. And I don't know what to go, I mean, we're supposed to speak without fear or favour, you know, I think the job of an MP is to, certainly I see the job as being to represent, the people, start with my people in North West Leicestershire, against the government and the establishment. And now what we seem to have is a lot of MPs who represent the government and the establishment against the people. That's an inversion of the job of a Member of Parliament. They said to me, you know, why are you willing to die on the hill of vaccine harms, you know, of an issue? And I said, well, because that's the hill you're killing my people on. No completely. I want to add two things to finish. One, you're in the Reclaim Party because that seemed to be the only option. Course you could do as an independent, that doesn't really happen in the UK, but also you're continually asking the government questions. One of the latest questions is did the MHRA inform the Minister of the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine had been switched? Tell us about Reclaim and I'm assuming you're yet to receive an answer to that government question.  Well Reclaim are a political party, they didn't have any MPs but they're well funded and they've got some lovely premises and they've got great people and they're also aligned with something called the Bad Law Project, so I have access to lawyers and solicitors and so I'm taking Matt Hancock to court for defamation and we have a very strong case. I'm probably going to take the Conservative Party to court for the way they handled my dismissal from the party, which is unbelievable. I'm on my fifth subject access request to the Cabinet Office. I mean, Peter, I've put in for all the information they're holding on me, and even when I'm over four, this is the fifth one going in now, I keep cutting down the number of keywords and compressing the time, and every time they come back and say, I mean, they must have a library on me. They haven't got a black book, they've got a whole library on me. And every time they come back and say, it's too much work. I mean, the last one was about 10 key words. And I said, it's only from 1st of January, 2017. I'll publish all the papers one day and it'll be fascinating, but goodness knows what they're hiding. They're certainly not willing to release any documentation. So I think we're going to have a massive, massive, massive bust up with the government over that. And if they're doing it to me, it won't be just me, will it? There'll be. Yeah, I mean, if there is any mitigation of my colleagues, and I'm not thinking of any any mitigation at all for their inactivity when so many of them, I mean, what you've got to understand, Peter, is people say to me, So there was a lovely female Conservative MP who will remain nameless, but she was elected in 19. And she came up to me a few months ago and said, Andrew, I'm really worried about you. You speak in the chamber on your own. You have all your meals on your own. You sit on your own table in the tea room and the dining room. No one talks to you. You seem really isolated. I'm really worried about you. I said, well, that's very touching. I said, but you've got to remember, 4,000 real people work in Parliament. The cooks, the cleaners, the waiters, the security guards, the police, I said, and they all come to me and 80% of those agree with me. So I'm not really isolated at all, am I? I said, actually, you're isolated, you just don't realise it. So it's not been that bad in Parliament. As far as the Pfizer data, it was again Dr. Josh Guetzkow sent me some from the Hebrew University, sent me some evidence and he's not a scientist, he's a criminologist but he's a specialist in fraud and he went through the Pfizer papers and discovered how they'd switched the vaccines. There were two batches in the initial batch, one that they basically made a Rolls-Royce vaccine up which they gave to 22,000 individuals and they had 22,000 in the placebo group who got a saline shot and that's what they got approval for with the MHRA and every other regulator around the world. But that wasn't the vaccine, that wasn't the Pfizer vaccine that was rolled out. And the smoking gun for the switch of the vaccines is the fact that the MHRA changed the protocols on day two of the mass rollout of the vaccination in the UK, and said that everyone got to stay at the vaccine centre for 15 minutes after day two because of the risk of anaphylactic shock and you only get anaphylaxis if there's endotoxins in the vaccines and you only get endotoxins in the vaccines if they're cultured up in bacteria such as Escherichia coli and the MHRA hadn't expected anaphylaxis because that is not how the vaccine that was given approval for was manufactured, it wasn't manufactured in bacteria with all the contaminants that would go with it. Now, you can't, to get approval for a drug, you have to use the same mechanism of production. You can't change anything because then you've got a different drug with different side effects. So basically, what my allegation is, supported by 44 pages of evidence supplied to me by a doctor of criminology from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, the government will not answer or even acknowledge, is that the vaccine that was rolled out in the UK and around the world was effectively completely untested and it also explains why the, I mean that the harms from the Pfizer trials of the very best vaccine they could make in in a very small, basically a bespoke vaccine that they made for 22,000 doses, I mean that was horrific enough and that should never have had approval but it was nothing like the harm profile we've seen in actuality through the VAERS system and the yellow card system and the fact that the vaccine is a different vaccine basically explains that as well. If they were doing that with Pfizer, I mean I have no doubt that Moderna and the same and of course I had the AstraZeneca vaccine which which was actually that bad. It was just quietly withdrawn, wasn't it? And it's interesting that the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, which is the AstraZeneca vaccine is not a messenger RNA. It's a DNA strand in an adenovirus vector. So it's different technology to the Pfizer and the Moderna. It's because obviously the DNA then will code for the messenger RNA. And so it's one step further back. It's interesting also that the, I asked for an urgent question in Parliament a few months ago because the Johnson & Johnson vaccine was withdrawn in America and I saw the FDA, the Federal Drugs Agency guidelines and it said stop basically, stop injecting the Johnson and Johnson and all stocks are to be destroyed. And the Johnson and Johnson that was also, a DNA strand not a messenger RNA strand and also in an adenovirus vector to get it into the into the cell. So it's interesting that basically both the vaccines, experimental vaccines were using the DNA adenovirus vector method, they were, both withdrawn and destroyed. But it is interesting that India are still producing effectively AstraZeneca under license. They call it Covishield in India. And of course they didn't stop the Australian version of the AstraZeneca vaccine until only a couple of months ago, so there's going to be a big kickoff there as well. So that's it. I sent it to the Attorney General because one of the questions I did ask was did the MHRA tell the Minister that they'd switched the vaccines, in which case if they didn't then the MHRA are guilty of potentially a crime which is I think it's a two-year prison sent us an unlimited fine, but if they did tell the minister, then how could the minister go out and say they're safe, effective, and tested when they knew that they weren't? I don't understand why the prime minister doesn't want to come back to me. I'm afraid the letter I sent him was a bit of a, do you still beat your wife question. There isn't a good answer, because either I'm going to nail the MHRA, or I'm going to nail the ministers. And it's also interesting, I think, you know, so many health ministers are deciding to not stand at the next general election. No, 100%. Andrew, I've watched your many speeches in the Commons and followed those written questions and I think for our UK viewers and listeners who are very frustrated at UK politics, I think as long as there remains someone like you speaking this truth, then there is hope. So thank you for what you do and thank you for your time today. Thank you very much for having me on. I'm sure we'll speak again in the future.

GUEST 1 OVERVIEW: Sebastian Salt is the Editor of Umbrella News and is a graduate in Latin American studies from La Trobe University. He is based in Madrid, Spain where he works for a local university as an English teacher, editor and translator. His overall focus is trying to understand how local events relate to more global developments. GUEST 2 OVERVIEW: Lance Forman is the proprietor of H. Forman and Son, a smoked salmon business that has been in operation for 118 years since 1905. His business is the oldest producer of smoked salmon in the world and developed smoked salmon as a way to preserve the `king of fish' Lance is also a former MEP for Brexit of the European Union for London. Lance Forman is an unabashed Brexiteer especially given ridiculous EU regulations that were so bad that his firm once had to inform consumers-via a warning label applied to a transparent package of salmon (at an expense of $20,000)- that his product “May contain fish”.

Show notes and Transcript... Dr Sebastian Gorka joins Hearts of Oak to discuss the latest bout of Trump Derangement Syndrome.  Dr Gorka is a unique figure in the US media and political scene as he is originally a Londoner with Hungarian background which gives him a deep understanding of European culture and politics.  And as someone who served in the Trump White House he has seen many attacks from the left and from The GOP on DJT.  The most recent indictment (No 3) is just the latest attack from the establishment who fear President Trump more than anyone else. There is no end to their hate and fear of MAGA.  Dr Gorka also discusses election integrity and the lack of action to protect this process before moving onto the latest sorry saga in the Hunter soap opera (an appointed special counsel) and we finish up by looking at Dr Gorka's 2016 book "Defeating Jihad: The Winnable War" and why this topic is no longer part of the conversation. Dr. Sebastian Gorka was named as the newest Talk Show Host on the Salem Radio Network Platform, and began his show AMERICA FIRST on New Years Day, 2019. His ascent to this role could not have been more unusual, or more of a true “American Story.” To find out how it began, you have to go back to the 1950s, to Communist controlled Hungary. Hoping for freedom after the utter devastation of the Second War, the proud nation of Hungary was instead taken over by a Stalinist dictatorship subordinate to Moscow. One young man, who had suffered under the Nazis, decided to resist and so Paul Gorka created a secret Christian student organization to subvert the Communist stranglehold of his homeland. Paul was eventually betrayed by the British double-agent Kim Philby, arrested by the Secret Police, tortured and then given a life sentence for fighting for democracy and liberty. After two years in solitary confinement, two years down a prison coal mine, and two years in the central political prison in Budapest, Paul was eventually liberated by the brave freedom fighters of the Hungarian Revolution of 1956. With the 17-year old daughter of a fellow political prisoner, Paul escaped across the minefields along the border of Western Hungary to a life of liberty in the UK, where Paul and Susan would be married and their son, Sebastian, was born. With parents who had lived as children under fascism and then escaped Communist Hungary, Sebastian was raised to love freedom. And his love of talk-radio developed early. As a child he would listen late into the night to the shows of the London Broadcasting Company with a small transistor radio under his pillow. It was with this special family background, and growing up under the influence of the Conservative warrior Margaret Thatcher, that Sebastian learned how to fight totalitarian ideologies, be they Fascism, Communism, or Global Jihadism. He would end up serving in the British Army reserve in a Military Intelligence unit, then after the fall of the Berlin Wall, in the first freely-elected Conservative administration in Hungary. The after the 9/11 attacks he became a professor on a Pentagon-funded counter-terrorism program run out of Germany. In 2008 he moved to America with his family where he continued to work for the Defense Department and become a proud American citizen in 2012. He obtained his doctorate in Political Science from Corvinus University in Budapest and was a fellow at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government. In Washington, he served as Associate Dean for Congressional Affairs and Relations to the Special Operations Community at National Defense University and has also taught on the Masters program at Georgetown University. In 2020, President Donald Trump named Gorka to the National Security Education Board. This board provides strategic consultation and was established by congressional act in 1991. Dr. Gorka has briefed the CIA, the DIA, the US Navy Seals, the Commandant of the Marine Corps, served as an expert for the DoJ during the Boston Bombing trial, and testified before Congress on the threat of Global Jihadism. He remains a guest instructor at the John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School, at Fort Bragg, the home of the Green Berets. Connect with Dr Gorka.... X:  https://twitter.com/SebGorka?s=20 GETTR:  https://gettr.com/user/sebgorka TRUTH:  https://truthsocial.com/@SebGorka SUBSTACK:  https://substack.com/@sebastiangorka WEBSITE:  https://www.sebgorka.com/ Interview recorded 16.8.23 *Special thanks to Bosch Fawstin for recording our intro/outro on this podcast. Check out his art https://theboschfawstinstore.blogspot.com/ and follow him on GETTR https://gettr.com/user/BoschFawstin and Twitter https://twitter.com/TheBoschFawstin?s=20  To sign up for our weekly email, find our social media, podcasts, video, livestreaming platforms and more... https://heartsofoak.org/connect/ Please subscribe, like and share!   Subscribe now Transcript (Hearts of Oak) Hello, Hearts of Oak, and welcome to another interview coming up in a moment with Dr. Sebastian Gorka. You will, of course, know him from his media time, but also his time in the White House. But we start this conversation looking at his background. He was born in the UK, grew up in London, also lived in Budapest for 16 years. Hungarian is his first language, and he brings a unique perspective, I think, to the US, understanding UK and US culture and politics more than most others. But then we of course get on to President Trump and his latest indictment. Number three, he will need a trophy cabinet to collect these. We discuss what exactly is happening. We discuss election integrity. We discuss David Wise being the special counsel, on the Hunter Biden case. And then we end up with something completely different, looking at Islam or Islamism or Jihad. The first book I read of Sebastian was Defeating Jihad, The Winnable War. A lot to pack in, in 45 minutes.  Dr. Sebastian Gorka, it is wonderful to have you with us today. Thank you for your time.  (Dr Sebastian Gorka) Thank you for inviting me today.  Not all. And obviously, @SebGorka on Twitter, GETTR, Substack is there, Sebastian Gorka, America first, what, every day, Monday to Friday, 3 p.m. Eastern Time. There's a lot. And of course your latest book, The War for America's Soul, is out and available. Lots to discuss, but if I can mention your website on your merchandise. I loved it. sebastiangorkastore.com. First of all, your FBI, Fascist Bureau of Intimidation, but then your LGBTQ, which I thought was lovely. You looked well in LGBTQ, let's get Biden to quit. I loved it. Yeah, it's sad. The FBI t-shirt, Fascist Bureau of Intimidation is now our second hottest selling item on the website, SebGorkaStore.com. And even before that, I designed a mug. With a photograph of the Gestapo and an FBI agent in his raid jacket with the big letters FBI. And this was six months ago, or maybe it was after the raid on President Trump's home. And I said, you know, 80 years from Germany to the United States, the FBI, Biden's Gestapo. And my producer, who's a pretty forward-leaning guy, pretty hardcore conservative, he said, that's a little bit too much, Seb. Yeah, that's a little bit. That is like the number one item, because sadly, and this kind of, I don't wanna go into too much detail here, but before I joined the White House, I did a lot of work with the FBI. I trained them. I trained literally thousands of agents and intelligence analysts on the ideology of Jihad. That was my job with my wife. We had the only external contract providing that kind of training to the Bureau. And I was proud to do that. Now, after what the FBI has become, raiding the homes of pro-life ministers, raiding President Trump's home on a trumped up garbage documents charge. If the FBI knocked on my door right now, Peter, I'd tell them, go talk to my lawyers, sod off. I mean, this is what has happened to America under the radical leftist neo-Marxist cabal that is today's Democrat Party. Its bonkers and I want to end with that touch on the Islam on the jihad because Defeating Jihad was at the first time I came across a book by you and I remember, it is this book here Defeating Jihad, fantastic book but we'll we will end off on that but if I can maybe start with, I mean you don't you don't need an introduction even for a UK audience, it's your, but you're not the typical, U.S. media or political personality. Your military, national security and political background is British and European. Do you want to touch on that because that sets you apart from many others? Yeah, I appreciate it. So yeah, I've had a pretty crazy whirlwind of a career. My parents escaped communist Hungary during the revolution in 56. My father created a secret Catholic student's organization in college to undermine the communist takeover. He was betrayed by Kim Philby, one of the Cambridge Apostles, one of the worst traitors of the Cold War. He was arrested at the age of 20, tortured and given a life sentence in a political prison. After six years, he was liberated literally by the revolutionaries who captured a Soviet tank in 56. And with the 17-year-old daughter of a fellow prisoner, he escaped to the West over a minefield, They made it to the UK. A few years later, they were married and those are my parents. I grew up in the UK, speaking Hungarian. My first language was Hungarian. I learned English in preschool and kindergarten. Hungarian is a difficult language. It is, yeah. According to the State Department, it is the hardest non-pictographic language. So if you leave out Chinese and Korean, it's the hardest non-pictographic because it's not related to anything. You can learn the Romance languages, the Indo-European languages. It's irrelevant. it is this kind of Martian language in the middle of Europe. I think it wires your brain differently. It's good for cognitive capacity if you can speak that language and other ones. Then in college, so I went to London University. In college, a buddy of ours used to disappear every two weeks and wouldn't come out drinking with us. One Friday, I said to him, dude, you're coming out with us this weekend. He said, no, I can't. Where are you going? And he refused to tell me. And I said, well, I'm not going to let you go unless you tell me where you're going. And he said, I can't tell you, but why don't you come with me? And I was this long-haired philosophy and theology student. I had hair down to my chin and kind of like on a bet, on a dare, I said, oh, okay. So I followed my buddy to this unmarked building in downtown London, this red brick building. And it turned out to be the headquarters of the Military Intelligence Reserve. So the intelligence cause TA element in London, and it was selection weekend. And I was given a pair of overalls with about 30 other people. And I'd driven in a lorry to the middle of nowhere. And I did selection for this weird iconoclastic bunch of eccentrics in the intelligence core. And I loved it. I mean, linguists, interrogators, photographic interpreters. So I joined the territorial army intelligence core in college, loved it. Then the whole communist system collapses. And because I spoke Hungarian, French, German, and English and had served in a British military unit. That parlayed itself into a job working for the first conservative, freely elected government in Hungary. So I ended up working as an assistant to the deputy minister of defense, helping the former Warsaw Pact Hungary get into NATO. So, that was milestone number two. And then just to cut it short, 9-11 hits, I had a bit of background in counterterrorism. And I'm invited to teach on a Pentagon-funded counterterrorism training course out of Germany. There's this beautiful base the Americans never gave back to the Germans after World War II. It's called Garmisch-Partenkirchen in the Marshall Center. And for four years, I would commute between Budapest and Bavaria. And I teach counterterrorism to a group of international officers. And eventually that translated to me and my American wife and our kids moving to America. I became a U.S. citizen, a professor of irregular warfare at National Defense University, at the Marine Corps University. And the last kind of milestone is the book you held up. The book, Defeating Jihad, got onto people's radar screens and helped me to get a job in the White House working for President Trump. I was deputy assistant to the president for strategy based upon all the work I'd done in counter-terrorism. And now I have a national radio show, And God's been very good to me, Peter. Funny, from Ealing to Budapest to D.C, it's quite a journey.  Can I, because in the US, I think probably from my point of view, there's only maybe Steve Hilton and Raheem Kassam who have an understanding of what happens over in Europe, both in being heavily involved in politics in the UK. So you're kind of a fish out of water there, and see things quite differently. I mean, the whole election integrity stuff, I know watching the votes coming in in London many times, it is a paper ballot. We would never consider an electronic voting machine. So you see things quite differently that way. Well, I do. And I'm kind of galled by the fact that, look, there's only one flag on the moon, and it's America's flag. And there's six of them. So we managed, out of all the nations on God's green earth, to send men to the moon half a dozen times. And we can't have modern elections run in ways that are fitting for a superpower. I mean, think about it. We don't have voter ID. In many states of the union, you don't have to prove who you are when you go and vote. You say who you are. They look up your name and your address. And if you can confirm the address in the big record in front of the poll worker, you're given a ballot and you vote, which is asinine. Democrats say showing an ID at the polling station is voter suppression of minorities, which of course is the most bigoted thing you can say because you're saying black people and brown people are too stupid to get a driver's license is really what the Democrats are saying. And not only that, thanks to COVID and many other things, we don't have an election day. Here in Virginia, I live just outside Washington, D.C. in Virginia, which is now run by a conservative governor, but even he has failed to change the fact that in the Commonwealth of Virginia, this probably shock your listeners, and if you don't believe anything I say, please do look it up. We have 45 days of voting. We vote for a month and a half before the election, which is just asinine. I mean, Mexico, which is in the midst of a drug-fueled insurgency, has voter ID. India, with a billion people, has voter ID. And the fact that we can't count our votes on election day and it's one day, and we don't have voter ID, it tells you why things like 2020 can happen. Okay, let's talk about President Trump. We've just seen another indictment. I'm kind of thinking he's gonna have to have a trophy cabinet of all these indictments because they're building up. What on earth is going on? Well, yeah, he posted on his social media site, Truth Social, last week after the third indictment here in Washington, DC. He, you know, tongue-in-cheek, he said, well, one more indictment and I've got this election sewn up. It's insane, I mean, utterly insane. And he's right. I mean, every time, you know, they drop another, you know, facetious, false indictment, his popularity actually increases. What's going on? I'll tell you what's going on. President Trump is a force of nature. In 2016, he got 64 million votes. Four years later, after being called a racist, a misogynist, an Islamophobe, a Nazi, and a white supremacist for four years by the mainstream media, he got 10 million more votes, which is unheard of. He got 74 million votes, the most of any incumbent president in history, despite the fact that the Democrats mailed out 81 million ballots to be not voted on on election day, but to be filled in by somebody somewhere and then posted back or dropped into collective ballot harvesting boxes. So despite all of the shenanigans, he gets more votes than any incumbent president. Now they don't have COVID, to have that cover of mailing out ballots, and they're very worried. The Uni-party, and look, I said this when I was in the White House. I said it when I left the White House, Donald Trump won despite the Republican Party and not thanks to the Republican Party. He is a deadly threat to the vested interests of the Uni-party, as Steve Bannon calls it. Why? Because he's not owned by any of their special interests. He's not owned by the Chamber of Commerce that owns the GOP. He's not owned by Big Oil or Big Pharma. He's not owned by the unions like the Democrats are. He is a clear and present danger to the quote-unquote political elite that just wants to control the lives of 330 million people, irrespective of what those people want. So, you know, the Democrats have to put him in prison. He's now, depending on which poll you look at, Peter, he's 20 to 40 points ahead of his nearest rival, the governor of Florida, Ron DeSantis. I mean, he is the de facto Republican nominee, and in the latest polling, he's beating Biden as well. So they're just desperate. They are throwing everything at him. This latest indictment, I know your listeners probably won't watch it or read it. This latest indictment is so Kafka-esque. It's so KGB tactics. They have indicted Mayor Giuliani, one of the greatest Americans who ever lived, who put five Mafia dons in prison when he was a prosecutor in New York prior to becoming the mayor of New York. They have indicted him for conspiracy because he retweeted a tweet saying, please call your state representatives and senators to request a special session so we can verify the results of the election. That tweet is deemed to be a felony by this woman, this prosecutor in Fulton County, who by the way, a little bit of a delicious tidbit, is the daughter of a former Black Panther extremist. I mean, you cannot make this stuff up. They have to stop him because he's not controlled by them.  And I mean what happened to Rudy was intriguing living through 9-11 watching America's mayor as he became and absolutely loved and yet because of his support for Trump the establishment just turns on him. I mean apart from Trump that he is the biggest example of the lunacy of the establishment. Yeah I mean look at you know go back and just Google 9-11 and Rudy Giuliani, and you'll see the cover of Newsweek, the cover of Time. He's standing there at ground zero on the pile of rubble. He's getting the New Yorkers back on their feet after 3,000 Americans and others were murdered by jihadi terrorists. And now he's some kind of traitor who should be given 200 years in prison. But look, it's not about Rudy. I mean, it happens to everybody. It happens to me or anybody else who works for the president or supports the president. But look at what happened to him. Remember Donald Trump five years ago. No, no, let's go six years ago. Let's go 10 years ago. Donald Trump was loved by everybody. I mean, rap singers rapped about being the Donald. You know, he would have lauded cameo appearances in, you know, Home Alone 2, the movie. He had, for 14 years, the most popular reality TV show in America. The Apprentice was the most popular reality TV show in America. He was loved. Everybody wanted to be the Donald. Everybody. The second he comes down the escalator, The second, he says, I'm a conservative and I want to be your president, he's the devil incarnate. This tells you what you're dealing with. This is who the left have become. This isn't your grandfather or even your father's Democrat party. Strong national security, pro-life, Catholics. The likes of JFK or Scoop Jackson, they would not be allowed into today's Democrat party. Today's left is open borders, if you're white, you're an oppressor, America is bad. This is what we're dealing with. So I've long said on my radio show, forget political labels, forget little r or little d, it's not conservative or liberal, it's not Republican or Democrat. The dividing line today in America and for much of our civilization is whether you love the country or not. If you love America, then you're in one tribe. If you hate America, then you're going to vote Democrat. Think about Obama, and it all starts with Obama. Obama said what during the election campaign? He said, I am going to fundamentally change this nation. Now, I don't know if you're married, Peter, but imagine if you said to your wife, I'm going to fundamentally change you, right? I don't think your wife would be too happy. You don't fundamentally change anything you love. You fundamentally change things you don't like or you hate. This is the perverse situation our civilization is in. We are being lorded over by people who hate the countries they come from and the civilizations they live in. I mean, translate it into another sector. Imagine you're a businessman and you utterly detest Coca-Cola. Why would you want to become the CEO of Coca-Cola, right? I mean, I don't know how these – it's perverse. Why would you wish to be in charge of that which you detest, unless, of course, you want to destroy it? Well, we're seeing that self-hatred across Europe, all on the left, where the left has abandoned its working class roots and become part of this woke agenda. But then the whole MAGA is a pushback on that and it's something different. It's not just the normal Republicans wanting states to be read. It's actually winning back the country and as someone in the UK it's fascinating watching the rise of the MAGA movement that puts your own country first which should be the norm. Yeah, I mean, think about it. You are lambasted. People are literally cancelled if they're public figures and they put on a red hat with the, letters M A G A. And what does that hat say? Is it a swastika? Is it the hammer and sickle, which would be fine, of course, for the left? No, it means make America great again. So you must be excoriated. You must be completely isolated and shunned from polite society if you want to make your country great again. I mean, it's truly beggar's belief, and again, it's not politics. I don't read autobiographies. I don't have the patience for autobiographies, but there's two. If you want to understand what's happened to America, there's two that I can't recommend more, and they're really life-changing, especially Andrew Breitbart's Righteous Indignation. His book on how as a drunk, mindless student at Tulane University, he suddenly became a conservative because he saw what they were doing to a black judge because he dared to be a nominee to the Supreme Court, and a conservative. This is the Clarence Thomas hearings. And chapter six of his book, Righteous Indignation, if you want to understand what the left has become, he paints it all from Antonio Gramsci in an Italian prison cell all the way through the Frankfurt School to Alinsky to Clinton to Obama. It is a masterpiece. So his book, Read Righteous Indignation. If you want to know what happened to conservative politics and to America, I was in the White House and it was Thanksgiving weekend and my boss Steve Bannon said, hey, you've got to read this book by J.D. Vance called Hillbilly Elegy. And I'm like, not interested. My wife had a copy of it. And it was Thanksgiving weekend. Went away for the long weekend. And I read the whole book that weekend. And the interesting about J.D. is, he's from a hillbilly family. He's from a real country, working class family. And he was no Trump supporter. When he wrote this, he was not a fan of Trump. Now he's a very Trumpian senator in DC. He's one of only two senators out of a hundred that I'll let on my show because he's a citizen politician, not a career politician. And in his book, which you can read in two days, three days. He just chronicles what happened to the working class in America through the eyes of his family. So how the people who literally built America, who travelled from Tennessee, from Kentucky to Ohio, became the factory workers, facilitated this incredible blossoming of prosperity and freedom after World War II, how basically the Republican Party took a massive dump on them 50 years ago and said, we can make stuff cheaper in China, we can make stuff cheaper in Mexico, we don't need factories in America, and consciously destroyed these families and said, yeah, fentanyl, who cares about fentanyl? Who cares about working class overdoses? We need to get the next shareholder meeting to demonstrate double digit growth for our companies. So this is why MAGA, this is why Brexit, this is why Maloney, this is why Modi. Because it's not party politics, it's people saying, you know what, my nation matters, and the people who built that nation matter, and we don't want to have career politicians who don't give a crap about the will of the people who say, I will represent you, become elected, and then do the polar opposite of what they were elected to do. So it's not about President Trump. It's about a global phenomenon, of the recrudescence of national sovereignty. And it's so fascinating that, you know, the word populism is a dirty word, which is, you have to stop for a second. Populism? You mean policies that are popular with the majority of the people, that's bad. If that's bad, you're either a communist or a fascist. And by the way, let's be clear, fascism is a left-wing policy. If you look at who Mussolini was, who invented fascism, it wasn't Hitler. The fasces is an ancient Roman symbol. If you look at the fact that he was an ardent communist before he invented fascism in the 1920s, you have to understand what these people are, whether they're AOC, whether they're Bernie Sanders, or whether they're Obama, whether they're you know, Klaus Schwab. These are fascists. No completely. We're seeing, actually it's exciting, the rise in populism, with many populist parties doing extremely well in Europe, until the poll, until the election, often in Spain, once we're going to have a majority with the party on the right, and suddenly they don't get that. Now the AFD, they're discussing banning the AFD because they're polling second in Germany. It's kind of the same tactics that we're seeing in America, more brazen, but we're seeing those same tactics to silence populism in Europe as well. Yeah, there's, this isn't well understood, so how we got here and what happened in 15 and 16, I strongly recommend to your viewers, there's a genius level guy who's been on my show several times, he was the head of cyber for the State Department in the Trump administration, His name is Mike Benz, B-E-N-Z, and you should get him on your show. I'm happy to connect you. And Mike Benz kind of, he made the light bulb go off for me because he explains, and he has a website called the Foundation for Freedom Online, where he has all the receipts, all the documents, all the inside video conferences from, you know, the global elitists admitting what they're doing. And Mike Benz, his huge contribution is the following. The foreign policy elite, which is totally Uniparty, right? I mean, let's be clear. The Republicans, the Democrats, when it comes to being a global police and blah, blah, blah, there's been a unanimity on that since the 1990s. And the foreign policy elite, quote unquote, built a complete superstructure to target and undermine populism abroad, whether it's Orbán in Hungary, whether it's Brexit with Obama coming and telling the British, you better not vote for independence because you'll be at the back of the queue, giggle, giggle, right? So for 30 years, they've created a system to undermine populist movements in other countries saying, oh, that's not good for us. So let's have a system where we're funding these NGOs, undermining conservatives because they're scary and fascist. And then what happened after 30 years of building this infrastructure to target the likes of Orbán or Brexiteers, when Trump comes along, what do they do? It's like the gun turrets of the ship turn from facing outwards to facing inwards. And the quote-unquote disinformation tools, the censorship tools, were targeted against populists at home. Again, do not take my word for it. Go and look at the unclassified documentation of how the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security were meeting with Twitter executives in Palo Alto on a weekly basis to have individual accounts deleted. How the story of Hunter Biden's laptop, which is, you know, all of the crimes of the Biden family, was suppressed by Palo Alto. And when that story broke, when the Hunter Biden laptop story broke four weeks before the election in 2020, you know, I tried to retweet it on my account. You couldn't, if you cut and paste the link onto your Twitter and you try to press post, it would refuse to post. Now that, you know, that's okay, I guess, I guess if you're trying to undermine an election in Cuba, but if you're doing it at home in front of your own citizens, that's when the light bulb goes off and you realize, yeah, these are fascists using fascist tools to control information to what end? Not to protect us from some boogeyman, but to maintain their grasp on power. Well, let me ask you on that issue, because I think a few days ago, program was sweetheart deal, David Wise is now special counsel. And I was trying to scratch my head trying to understand this because it seemed to be good, but then why is this happening now? For what reason? What is Biden playing at in putting this in play now? And then it was really David Wise was good, then not. So what is happening on that? But we've had Miranda Devine, Garrett Ziegler. We've discussed the stuff on Hunter, but suddenly this appears out of nowhere. Well, it's very easy to explain why, because they have to protect the Biden's for the next 15 months. I mean, remember, David Weiss is the Wilmington, Delaware, U.S. attorney who investigated Hunter Biden for four years, waited until last month to give him a sweetheart deal with universal immunity that he didn't disclose to the judge, and the judge exploded in Wilmington, Delaware, to give him a universal immunity deal on the felonious handgun purchase, the non-payment of taxes. He waited for all the other crimes to expire past their five-year statute of limitations. So he's the guy who's protected the Biden's for five years. And now, because of the pressure on the Biden's, his boss at the Department of Justice, the Attorney General, makes him, quote-unquote, special counsel to investigate Hunter Biden even further. Why? Well, very simply, if he's still under investigation, you can't ask questions about him in Congress. That's the buried lead. If an individual is under quote-unquote active investigation, when the attorney general is next testifying in front of Congress, and the chairman of the Judiciary Committee says, We want to talk about the $20 million that was sent to Hunter Biden from China and then split up amongst the family, including Joe. The attorney general says, excuse me, Mr. Chairman, this is an ongoing case I cannot comment. So it's just blatant political top cover from an existing biased individual. And by the way, it's also fascinating, if you read the statute, the statute in black and white says a special counsel is appointed when there is conflict of interest. The reigning regime, because of their implied connections, cannot fairly investigate a case. You hire somebody from outside of government. You find a lawyer, an attorney, a judge who's not part of the federal government to be the ombudsman, to be the fair investigator. You can't hire your flunky deputy from Wilmington. So the whole thing is in contravention of statute itself. But why? Because they have to protect Biden for the next 15 months. On to, at CPAC, I heard many of the candidates speak, except DeSantis, and I heard him speak in Florida a month before at CNP. And as much as I love what DeSantis has done in Florida, but my thinking is if Trump is in the ring, you don't get in the ring. You can't win. And like some of the other candidates, they're maybe looking for a position in the White House. DeSantis thinks he can beat Trump or, I mean, explain that because Trump has an unassailable lead. Why would you be crazy enough to step into the ring and try and beat him? Well, look, ego. I mean, why are people like that fat embarrassment, Chris Christie, or losers like Asha Hutchinson that nobody's heard of? Why are they running? Or Mike Pence. Mike Pence's political career after January 6th is dead. I mean, it is forever dead. The guy who said 48 hours, I played the video on my show multiple times last week, the guy who says two days before January 6th. Yes, there were serious problems with the election, and we're going to find out, and I'm going to do my duty as president of the Senate. And then he caves, the yellow belly completely collapses. That guy, nobody's, anybody who supported President Trump, or 74 million of them, none of them are going to vote for him, who ran and hid. So why the heck is he running? So there's a saying in Hungary that these are the people who if they jumped off their ego onto their IQ, they'd be committing suicide. So a lot of these people, it's just totally out of touch ego. For Vivek, who's been very deferential to President Trump, but has said, look, there are people who will vote for me who won't vote for Trump, which is fine. You can say that. But he's the guy who went to Miami the day of the president's arraignment, said, if I'm elected, I'm going to pardon President Trump. And he's sitting there with a truth social hat on, President Trump's media app. This guy is playing it very smart. I had him on my show multiple times and said, Vivek, you're not going to win, But I'd love to see you as the Jared Kushner of a second Trump term. You're an incredibly successful private business entrepreneur. You should be the innovation guy in the next Trump cabinet. So he's playing a very canny game. When it comes to DeSantis, I said on my radio show maybe two years ago, or at least a year and a half ago, if he's smart. He comes in as the vice president. He supports President Trump, he runs with him, and then in 2028, he just slides into the top slot. If he knows what he's doing, that's what he does. And he has just, it's like, you know, during the Vietnam War, it's like there's peace protesters that poured gasoline on themselves, poured petrol on themselves, and then, you know, self-immolated. This campaign has self-immolated for a couple of very clear reasons. Number one, and even off the record, his fans will tell you this, he's a charismatic black hole. I mean, he has no charisma. I think he's on the scale. I think he's a little bit on the scale and he doesn't have, he has a little bit of that autistic incapacity to socialize. That's why his wife is essential. His wife is this beautiful, charming, erudite woman. She kind of makes up for his complete lack of charm. So number one, you gotta charm voters. Number two, his, I call it his honour deficit. I mean, what he said on the Monday after the brag, the New York indictments were leaked against President Trump was appalling. I mean, just utterly appalling. He made two quips about, I don't know about hush money for porn stars, giggle, giggle, right, as the governor of Florida. And then he says, I'm not gonna get involved because I've got business in Florida. Hey, dickhead, President Trump lives in Florida. Look at the map. Mar-a-Lago is in Florida. He is a citizen of the state over which you preside, and you're not gonna get involved. And lastly, if you know his backstory, the most galling of all, he's a former JAG. He's a former member of the Judge Advocate Corps, which means what? He's a former military prosecutor. Of all people, the probity of the judiciary should be of importance to him. And he says, I'm not gonna get involved. When a prosecutor in Manhattan deletes the statute of limitations. Expunges it so he can charge President Trump with something that happened years ago that didn't happen, and you don't have an opinion? I mean, utter, utter honesty and integrity deficit. And you know, the dumbest thing of all? All he needed to say, just one sentence, this is an outrage and it should outrage all conservatives and I will not stand for it as governor of the Florida, of the state in which President Trump lives. One sentence and he would have looked like a leader. And then one additional thing, I'm not sure percentage wise, but for a lot of people who care about foreign policy, his utter U-turn on Ukraine was a disaster. When he says on, I think it was Tucker's show, So, we don't care about this, it's not relevant, he gets a lot of crap, and then 72 hours later he says, oh yes, Ukraine is important, dude. This is the only thing you had to prove something on, okay? You've been running Florida, you've got a little bit of domestic credentials, the one thing you have to convince people of is your foreign affairs national security credentials. When you do a 180 on war in Europe, not a good look, not a good look. What are your thoughts on how we've seen three indictments, as I said, the more they do, the more Trump's support goes up. And I guess every MAGA wants that mugshot of Trump because what they're trying is not working. His support going up and they thought they could I guess embarrass conservative voters to make them think he was too toxic. It's not working and yet they keep trying. Do they keep on that tactic? Do they try something else? Because at the moment it's not working.  Well look you're trying you're trying to get me to, channel lunatics. What they're doing isn't rational. What they're doing is. When you believe, I mean, let's just say one example. This individual has been labelled by the left, by Democrats, and by the mainstream media, the mainstream media, as a Nazi and a white supremacist, as an anti-Semite. This is the man who, after 23 years of broken promises from Clinton to Bush to Obama, 23 years of presidents saying, yeah, yeah, we're going to move the embassy, broken promises for 23 years, President Trump comes in and says, yeah, we're going to move the embassy and we're going to recognize Jerusalem. That guy whose daughter converted to Judaism, whose grandchildren are Jewish, he's the anti-Semite? I mean, it is a cult. I mean, TDS used to be a joke. Trump derangement syndrome, we threw that around as a joke. It's not a joke. It's a clinical condition. When you accuse a man of being a dictator. Who did nothing dictatorial, in fact, had the most open administration ever, was giving impromptu press conferences for 40 minutes as he's getting on Marine One, the helicopter, That guy's a dictator?, but the people you voted for are literally sending teams of armed FBI agents to bust down the door of a pro-life preacher in Philadelphia in front of his seven screaming kids. But that administration, they're the good guys. So I can't, look, my job, my whole life has been strategy. That's the thing I do. That was my title in the White House. That's based upon reality, empirical evidence, on logic. I can't tell you what their strategy is because it's based upon rank hatred, recuperation, and just irrationality. I mean think about this every indictment, every indictment has made him more popular and raised him more money. I had Lord Black on my show yesterday, Lord Conrad Black, and he said, he made this point that kind of like, boom, you know, kind of obvious, but yeah. Nothing they've done, nothing they've done has hurt him. Zero. So why are they doing it? Because they're insane, and because they think that if they can actually put him in prison, they can get Biden re-elected. And the joy of it all, and this is what I say with some, you know, frequency on my show, is the other side, they're evil bastards. I mean, really, if you are okay with having a 14-year-old girl, healthy girls, breasts removed in the name of transgenderism or chemically castrating a 12-year-old boy because he thinks he's a girl. If you're okay with that, you're actually demonic. I mean, you are pure evil in league with the dark one. So no doubt, evil, cunning evil bastards. But they're also stupid. This is the nice thing about... It's also dangerous because stupid people can be dangerous, but they're really dumb. They don't have a Newt Gingrich. They don't have a Victor Davis Hanson on their side. Thank the good Lord, all right? I mean, they're really dumb because they haven't even read the Constitution, Peter. The Constitution of the United States is pretty clear about who can be president. You have to be in your 30s. You have to be 35 or older. You have to be a natural born citizen, born to Americans. You don't have to be born in America. That's not correct. You have to be born to American citizens and you have to be a permanent resident in America for at least the last 14 years before the election. That's it. You can be a felon. You can have been charged and convicted of crimes that would lead to 400 years in prison. It doesn't matter. You can still be the president. That's how stupid they are. I just want to finish off on the book I mentioned, obviously your latest book, The War for America's Soul, I think that was 2019, and that is available. But I said at the beginning, defeating jihad, the winnable war. Just to finish, just on a completely different subject, the issue of, and for years I've studied Islam, for 10, 12, 13 years, and it's that cultural clash between the freedoms that Islam has and the freedoms the West have and then jihad, Islamism coming out of that. And it's not a topic that seems to be on the table for discussion a lot. And I was intrigued going to CPAC and it wasn't even mentioned and yet that is a threat just as China is a threat, just like many other issues are a threat. And I wanted just to finish on kind of your thoughts on that and why it is not part of the mainstream discussion. Well, it's not part of the mainstream discussion here in America, and for a very good reason. I mean, think about it. ISIS was on the front pages for years and years and years. I mean, American citizens being beheaded on video, the Yazidi Christian hostage-taking, Jordanian fighter pilots being burnt alive in cages. People forget ISIS was a thing. This was the biggest jihadi insurgency in history. I mean, they controlled multiple countries in the Middle East. And when we came in, we said no. President Trump said, unleash Special Operations Command, unleash Fort Bragg, unleash Delta, and get the stinking lawyers out of the way. I mean, like Shakespeare said, kill the lawyers first. We got the lawyers out of the way, and what happened? We have been told by Obama that ISIS is a generational issue. You're just going to have to suck it up and live with it. He actually said a generational issue. President Trump said, no, kill them all. Within five months of us coming into the administration, the caliphate, the caliphate of ISIS had ceased to be. People forget that. I mean, who talks about ISIS now? Nobody because we let our boys give them all a dirt nap. That's why it's not on the radar screen. Does it mean it's over? No, absolutely not. Does it mean that there won't be jihadi attacks in America because this administration is letting 6,000 illegal immigrants across the border every single day? You think you got it bad with a couple of rubber dinghies in the channel? Try 6,000 a day. We've had at least 40 people on the terrorist watch list come across the border that we know of, that we know of. So I'm not saying it won't come back. Why it's not on the radar screen? Because of the bloody good job our guys did back in 2016 and 2017 and 2018. But no, if you want to understand the threat of jihad, you have to understand that... The biggest lie since 9-11 is that they're not Muslims, right? That Al-Qaeda and ISIS are not Muslims.  Well, no, that's actually a lie. Read the Quran. Read chapter 9, verse 29. Hunt down the infidel after the holy month and kill them all unless they surrender. That's not Seb Gorka speaking. That's not Bin Laden. that's actually the word of God as quote-unquote dictated to the illiterate merchant Muhammad you know in Medina in Mecca 1400 years ago. The idea that these are perversions of Islam. Yeah you're an apologist for those who are living a very pure form of Islam because who was Muhammad? He wasn't quote-unquote the last prophet. Muhammad was, if he existed at all, he was what? He was a warrior. He is a man who went to Medina and literally wiped out a whole Jewish tribe, literally wiped out whole Arab polytheistic tribes. To the last man jackal, he killed them. That's who Muhammad was. The idea that it's the religion of peace. Well, then learn Arabic. Islam doesn't mean peace. It means submission. Submission to what? To the will of Allah. And what kind of God is that? It's a very different God from the Jewish God. It's a very, very different God from the Christian God. It is a God of zero relationship to the believer and a man, not a man, a deity who can be utterly capricious. If Allah says murder is good tomorrow, it's good. And he can change his mind the day after and say it's bad. He's not truth. God for Christians is the good. There's no such conceptualization of the good. You're not allowed to describe God, right? You're not allowed to talk about his essence. That is blasphemy. To say that you know God, or you are in relationship with God is totally haram. It is total blasphemy in the Islamic faith. But these are the ground truths that you're not allowed to talk about. But people need to read the Quran, read the Quran, read the reliance of the traveller, read the actual Muslim texts about Muhammad, and then understand why... Here's the last example. Why? There's no such thing as an Arab motorcar. Not only is there no such thing as an Arab motorcar, Peter, there isn't an Arab bicycle. Think about that. That tells you about what this deformed theology has done, to knowledge, truth, and science. The best book on all of this, and it's a short read, it's about 250 pages, is my friend Robert Riley's The Closing of the Muslim Mind. His discussion on the deformed theology that explains why Al-Qaeda, why no Muslim bicycles, Why 9-11? It is mandatory. It was one of the texts I made mandatory for the officers that I trained when I was still a professor.  Dr. Sebastian Gorka, I appreciate your time today. Thank you so much. God bless all of you, all of your viewers. Thank you, Peter. Keep doing what you do.

Wow, that was a bit of an adventure.If life is indeed a journey, and not a destination, then the route to this weeks episode has been like off-roading in an Austin Allegro with a duff clutch pedal. It is fair to say we have faced a few challenges this week, but in amongst it all we have also learnt three valuable lessons.As far as TCD (sorry Lucy) is concerned if the wi-fi connection ain't rock solid then we fade faster than the promises of a Brexiteer...Strange things happen in Phil Brown's hotel suite when he isn't looking.If you find yourself in a Swedish Burger King, try the Nuggets.Oh, and in amongst it all we actually had a semi-serious chat about The Leavers.See you on the road,hTCD Merch StoreBecome Purple and support the showThe Invisible Man Volume 1: 1991-1997The Invisible Man Volume2: 1998-2014FacebookInstagramWebsite

#450 Am “I” Bovvered? - Richard is now wax free, but contemplating a career change, His guest is actor, writer, stand up and phenomenon Catherine Tate. They discuss whether Catherine and Tom Cruise are friends now, crying in Twickenham station, how Mcfly were the launchpad for Lauren, whether Noel Edmonds is a monster, doing sketches with war criminals and Brexiteers, not being told your series has been cancelled, why the Queen of Oz is NOT based on any ginger prince. Plus find out if Catherine would rather date a man who was a six foot penis or a man with a tiny man instead of a penis.Come and see RHLSTP live - all dates and confirmed guests here http://richardherring.com/rhlstpSUPPORT THE SHOW!Watch our TWITCH CHANNELSee extra content at our WEBSITE Become a member at https://plus.acast.com/s/rhlstp. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Also, UVF flags now outside Windsor Park.

Keir Starmer's column on Wednesday morning in right-wing tabloid newspaper The Express is another step in the Labour leader's transformation from all guns blazing Remainer to born again Brexiteer. But he's not the first Labour leader to turn to the right-leaning press to prove his prime ministerial credentials as the next general election draws ever closer.What does this mean for Labour and where does this leave Britain's place in the world, and its relationship with Europe if Labour are the next government in power? And what on earth is 'Securonomics' - the new economic model Starmer's potential Chancellor Rachel Reeves launched in Washington DC last week that will seek to boost post-Brexit Britain.Plus - the curious case of Joe Biden's former advisor fleeing to Moscow to seek 'safety' and citizenship. Hmm.

Brexiteers promised the end of UK manufacturing. They may have been right. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Today we take you behind the scenes at Nat Con: the Conservative-ish conference taking place in London this week. It's a meeting of hard Brexiteers, nationalists, libertarians, and the 'anti woke'. With a smattering of Holocaust minimisers, homophobes and climate-deniers thrown in for good measure. It's an exciting place - attended by senior cabinet ministers too - and today we ask if they are the fringe or the future of the Conservative Party.

Will Kemi Badenoch, the business and trade secretary, lose her supporters in the ERG, after the government confirmed that it would be going back on its pledge to remove all EU legislation from UK law by the end of 2023? James Heale speaks to Katy Balls and Kate Andrews.

What unites the US Republican Party, Brexiteers and the DUP? This week, Joe and Dion look at the magical thinking that has replaced reason among those who once believed they were born to rule in Washington and London - and how the DUP showed them the way. Behind the three-word slogans, the bluster and the demonisation of minorities, what insecurities are driving the supremacists? And what would your reaction be if, as Joe once did, you answered the door to the Reverend Ian Paisley?Free State with Joe Brolly and Dion Fanning is a Gold Hat Production in association with SwanMcG.For more on Free State: https://freestatepodcast.com/To get in touch with the podcast: info@freestatepodcast.comTwitter: @dionfanning @JoeBrolly1993 @freestateirlInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/thefreestatepodcast/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Story of Moore StreetLast week the Moore Street Preservation Trust held an Urgent Public Meeting in Liberty Hall in Dublin to discuss the crisis surrounding the future development of the Moore St. Battlefield site and the threat posed to these historic 1916 laneways by a developer. The meeting was chaired by Christina McLoughlin who is the niece of Sean McLoughlin. He was appointed Commandant General of the Republican forces in Dublin after James Connolly was wounded. A short film by acclaimed Belfast filmmaker Sean Murray – The Story of Moore Street 1916 – and narrated by Stephen Rea was shown to very warm applause. Frank Connolly for SIPTU which supports the campaign welcomed everyone to Liberty Hall.To Be Or Not To Be.As this column goes to press it appears that the British PM Rishi Sunak and Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission have reached an Agreement on the Protocol.  The so-called ‘Windsor Framework.' To add to the excitement Dame Arlene Foster is giving off because King Charles is having tea with Ursula von der Leyen – a proverbial storm in a tea cup. The next few days - or longer - will see how the new Agreement goes down particularly among the Brexiteers here in the North. Remember the majority of people here voted against Brexit. Watch this space. Remembering Wounded KneeOn 27 February 1973 several hundred Native Americans of the Oglala Lakota people occupied Wounded Knee in South Dakota in a move intended to highlight their demand for sovereign rights. The stand-off between the Native American people and federal authorities lasted 71 days and involved daily fire-fights. Two Native Americans were killed.Horror in Palestine and the MediterraneanIsraeli settlers danced in the street as they burned 75 Palestinian homes and killed a Palestinian man in Huwara. The plight of the people of Palestine gets worse day by day. It is an international disgrace that this is allowed to continue. Apartheid Israel is evil and inhumane. The international community must defend international law, condemn such human rights abuses and stand up for the rights of people.

He’s in the news again this week — after persuading Joe Manchin that the climate and healthcare bill he’s pushing isn’t inflationary. Larry Summers has had a storied career, as the chief economist of the World Bank, the treasury secretary under Clinton, and the director of the National Economic Council under Obama. He also was the president of Harvard University from 2001 to 2006 and remains there as the Charles W. Eliot University Professor. You can listen to the episode right away in the audio player above (or on the right side of the player, click “Listen On” to add the Dishcast feed to your favorite podcast app). For two clips of our convo — on how the US government spent way too little during the Great Recession and way too much during the pandemic, and how we can help the working class cope — pop over to our YouTube page.The episode has a lot of thematic overlap with our recent discussion with David Goodhart, author of Head, Hand, Heart: Why Intelligence Is Over-Rewarded, Manual Workers Matter, and Caregivers Deserve More Respect. Here’s a new transcript. And below is a clip from that episode on how our economy overvalues white-collar brain power:Back to inflation talk, here’s a dissent:I’ve been reading your blog for a little over a year now, and listening to Dishcast, which is great. I’ve noticed a few things, however, that I would like you to perhaps respond to, or at least consider. First, what you refer to as “wokeness” on the left is, I agree, an obnoxious problem that has been exacerbated by social media. But I think your recent guest Francis Fukuyama has it mostly correct in his new book, Liberalism and Its Discontents, when he identifies illiberal trends on the political left as being more of an annoyance, or at the very least, far less of a threat to the republic than illiberal trends on the right. Second, I completely disagree with this rather lazy salvo from you: “Biden’s legacy — an abandonment of his mandate for moderation, soaring inflation, an imminent recession, yet another new war, and woker-than-woke extremism — has only deepened it.” It simply is not the case that Biden has not, especially when forced to, hewed towards moderation. Yes, he is attempting to respond to a leftward shift in the Democratic Party by trying to govern more from the left, but this is simply a reflection of political reality. In addition, much of his agenda has been batted down, but more on that in a moment. Next, inflation and an imminent recession have a lot more to do with what the Fed has done over the last four decades — and definitely since the financial crisis of 2008 — than with Joe Biden. On this theme of a highly financialized economy nearing the end of the neoliberal era, I recommend Rana Foroohar on Ezra Klein’s latest podcast, where she talks about the popping of the “Everything Bubble.” Asset-value inflation, deindustrialization, a perverse focus on shareholder value rather than investing in Main Street or even R&D, and an utter lack of policy solutions, have caused this. In addition, as Foroohar herself says, the changes we need to make in our economy are going to be, in the short-to-medium term, inflationary. This means policymakers have to start making policy that actually helps both people and infrastructure, which means spending money. Unfortunately, the garden has gone untended for so long that we’re teetering on the brink of becoming a really shitty country if we don’t take more aggressive action. In addition, with regard to an upcoming recession, Noah Smith wrote on his Substack recently that Keynesian economics would suggest that a quick recession now in order to stomp out inflation would be better in the long run than milquetoast attempts to curb it by raising interest rates too slowly. The idea is that recessions — especially fast and somewhat shallow ones — can be weathered, but inflation that goes on for too long leaves lasting scars on the economy. (Smith identifies the Volker recessions as probably permanently damaging the Rust Belt.) Personally, what I worry about more on the left is not “woke-ism,” but the trendy socialist/ironic/weird outlets like Jacobin or Chapo Trap House, which seem to be doing their damndest to convince younger, more impressionable and less educated people that the whole country is fucked; it’s designed to be fucked because capitalism is fucked; and only its imminent collapse will allow for problems to be solved through revolution/redistribution. Believe me, that sentiment is becoming a real problem, and the people who buy into it are every bit as ideologically rigid, illiberal, and closed to inquiry as those on the rabid right.Next up, listeners sound off on last week’s episode with Fraser Nelson, the British journalist who sized up the prime minister race. The first comment comes from “a long-time libertarian in Massachusetts”:I’ve been reading the Dish for about a year and finally subscribed thanks to your fascinating interview with Fraser Nelson. I was particularly glad to be alerted to Kemi Badenoch.It’s taken awhile to pull the trigger on subscribing to the Dish because of your Trump bashing, since you sound more like Hillary Clinton than William Buckley. I’m perfectly fine with bashing Trump, but I prefer to see it paired with an acknowledgment of the forces that created him, i.e. the abandonment of the middle class by the two major parties, particularly the Democrats. I do think half the country would lose its mind if Trump runs again, so in that sense I sympathize with your sentiments. But the larger context is essential.Some episodes our listener might appreciate — ones sympathetic to the concerns of middle-class Trump voters — include Michael Anton, Mickey Kaus, Ann Coulter and David French. More on the Fraser Nelson pod:Thank you for an outstanding episode. Nelson has almost persuaded me to take out a Spectator subscription! I thought he summed up eloquently and fairly the state of the Conservative Party, Johnson, Sunak and Truss, and the challenges that lie ahead.Like many Brexiteers — and Nelson half-acknowledges this — the Tories have not grappled with the realities of Brexit. The most obvious lacuna in your discussion was the economy. You cannot leave the EU and not increase the size of the state. You have to have more customs arrangements (as we have recently seen at Dover), more vets, more checks and so on, ad nauseam. It’s all very well for conservatives to argue for a smaller state, but they haven’t defined what that will look like and how the services people use now (education, transport, local government, the legal system etc) will be improved, i.e. funded to a better extent than now. Underfunding is obvious and no amount of arguing “we can do it more efficiently” will cut it — the Tories have had 12 years to fix this.Moreover, picking fights with the EU has meant less investment, reduced business confidence and increased uncertainty — except of course in Northern Ireland, which has access to the single market and where business is booming. Listen to NFU President Minette Batters talk about the issues surrounding Truss’s free trade deals with Australia and New Zealand, or fishermen now dealing with the consequences of Brexit. They were once fans. Not so much now.James Carville once said, “It’s the economy, stupid.” Promising tax cuts now when much of the Western world is likely to enter a recession is ridiculously irresponsible, but hey ho, it’s a political campaign and reality will bite once we have a new prime minister, whoever she is.Also, I look forward to hearing Marina Hyde on the Dishcast!This next listener takes issue with some of my phrasing:I enjoyed the Nelson episode overall! But I have to take issue with a rare faux pas from you, where you said that Rishi Sunak is “himself obviously a globalist, just by his very career and nature.” I can’t really understand how you came to this conclusion. Is anyone who worked overseas for some time a “globalist”? Are you a “globalist” because your moved to America? What about Sunak’s “nature” makes him so?Back in 2016, Sunak supported Brexit, which was seen as the losing bet, despite much pressure from David Cameron. And he has set out very clearly in his leadership campaign that he thinks, for example, we need to be tougher on border control. Neither of these things strike me as globalist, nor a return to the Cameron era.On the other hand, I agree with your characterisation of Truss — who voted Remain before undergoing a miraculous and instantaneous change of heart the day after her side lost — as a “dime-store Thatcher.”Speaking of border control, here’s David Goodhart — also from a British perspective — on why elites favor open borders:One more listener on Fraser pod:As a Spectator subscriber (and Glasgow Uni man), I very much enjoyed Fraser Nelson. Mishearing (I think) at around the 37 minute mark when he seemed to refer to Boris getting a first at Oxford, I was reminded of this fine b****y exchange with David Cameron in the Sunday Times back in the day:Surely Boris has been the man Cameron had to beat, ever since they were at school together. 'This is one of the great myths of politics', says the PM [Cameron]. 'These things grow up and it's so long ago no one challenges them, but I don't think we really knew each other at school, he was a couple of years ahead of me. He was very clever.'Then Cameron explodes into a beaming grin. 'But', he says exultantly. 'Boris didn't get a First! I only discovered that on the Panorama programme the other night... I didn't know that'. He is suddenly lit up, almost punching the air with joy.And in that outburst of public-schoolboy competitiveness — Cameron, of course, did get a First — he reveals everything we've always thought about him.Also, when Boris was described as believing the untrue things he said at the time he said them, I’m reminded of George Costanza’s credo that “it’s not a lie if you believe it!” (which, for a fairly left liberal Tory, you’d perhaps take over a Trump analogy).Lastly, a listener looks to a potential guest:If you wish to continue to mine the vein of the global power landscape, its recent evolution this century, and its implications: Condoleezza Rice. She has an interesting perspective from one whose expertise is Russia and is a past practitioner of American statecraft with Russia and China.Thanks, as always, for the suggestion. Get full access to The Weekly Dish at andrewsullivan.substack.com/subscribe

Jennifer Senior was a long-time staff writer at New York magazine and a daily book critic for the NYT. Her own book is the bestseller, All Joy and No Fun: The Paradox of Modern Parenthood. She’s now a staff writer at The Atlantic, where she won the 2022 Pulitzer for “What Bobby McIlvaine Left Behind,” a story about 9/11. But in this episode we primarily focus on her essay, “It’s Your Friends Who Break Your Heart.”You can listen to the episode right away in the audio player above (or click the dropdown menu to add the Dishcast to your podcast feed). For two clips of our convo — on why friends with different politics are increasingly rare, on how Jesus died for his friends — pop over to our YouTube page. A new transcript is up in honor of what we are still learning about Trump’s attempted violent coup: Bob Woodward and Robert Costa on the perpetual peril of Trump. Below is a segment of that convo — probably the most significant one we’ve had on the Dishcast yet:Turning to the debate over abortion in the ashes of Roe, a reader dissents:I’m having a hard time understanding why you’re so misleading about abortion rights in the US compared to other nations, and naive about protection of the other rights under the 14th Amendment. Germany allows abortions up to 12 weeks for any reason, but what’s remarkable about Germany is not the 12-week mark, but that Germany offers pre-natal care, child care, employment guarantees, etc. that make it much easier for a woman if she chooses to go through with her pregnancy. The US doesn’t have anything like this. And even with the new right in America pretending to hop on board the social insurance train, passing any laws in a conservative-majority Congress that would provide more social services to pregnant women would deliberately NOT address or protect the right of a woman to control her own fertility — that is, to decide to have a child or not. In other words, the interests of a woman’s bodily autonomy and reproductive control would be denied. That makes women, on the whole, unable to live freely in society. But we don’t have to hop over to Europe to run a comparison. Canada protects abortion rights for any reason, with most clinics providing the procedure up to 23 weeks. This aligns with the (previous) fetal viability cutoff that Roe protected. And recently Mexico decriminalized abortion entirely, which paves the way for full, legal abortion rights.The US is now the regressive anomaly, not the progressive outlier you insist we are. And your idea that abortion can just be decided via democracy is cute — maybe that would’ve been true in the past — but SCOTUS could care less about the legislative process. You only have to look at their recent gun decision to realize that. You should make these things clear when you discuss abortion, instead of conveniently obfuscating the context and facts.As far as your confidence that the other rights under the 14th Amendment — gay marriage, access to contraception, etc. — will stand firm, I’m not sure why. Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Coney-Barrett evoked stare decisis in their confirmation hearings, and this turned out to be a shameless lie from all of them. With the conservative majority in place, they could then take up the Dobbs case and use it to overturn Roe entirely — stare decisis be damned.Alito left the door open to address Obergefell, etc. in his draft opinion, so why would you think Thomas taking it a step further is just him “trolling”? The majority of Americans wanted Roe left in place; its provisions were the compromise that balanced the interests of the woman with that of the fetus that you incorrectly thought was lacking. (Listen to Ezra Klein’s podcast with court expert Dahlia Lithwick to understand why that is). Yet despite its popularity, Roe was struck down. The majority of Americans support gay marriage. But the conservative court has publicly stated now that they don't care about what Americans want or think. Alito and Thomas have clearly said what they're willing to go after next. Kavanaugh playing footsie with the idea that those other rights are safe is just another lie that you are too willing to fall for, as I was too willing to think they wouldn't, in the end, touch Roe.As far as healthcare access in Germany, Katie Herzog made that point during our “Real Time” appearance last Friday:From a “Real Time” watcher:I disagree with you on quite a few issues, but appreciated your level-headed commentary on Bill Maher’s show. You’re one of the only people I saw today who forcefully made the point that the SCOTUS decision still allows for action by Congress — it’s a crucial point that has been totally lost in this discussion.From another fan of Bill’s show:I appreciated your take pointing out that the US is the only country that has made abortion rights a constitutional right, and I do understand your argument that this is something that needs to be decided through the democratic process. But I’m wondering if perhaps, on a deeper level, you’re shooting yourself in the foot. Your attitude has been for a long time that America is unique, exceptional, in its supposed commitment to individual freedom, as reflected in its constitution. Doesn’t that imply that enshrining personal rights in its constitution is in fact a perfect evocation to our country’s exceptionalism, what sets it apart from the cynical bickering and proceduralism of European parliamentary systems?I believe in democracy, tempered by constitutional restraints. So the kind of judicial supremacy you seem to be advocating seems outside that. I repeat that I would not have repealed Roe, for stare decisis and social stability reasons. But for the same reason, I wouldn’t have voted for it in 1973. I also believe that the Court could approximate your vision, in defending minority rights. But women are hardly a minority, and many women — at about the same rate as men — want abortion to be illegal.Many more dissents, and other reader comments on abortion, here. That roundup addressed the concern over stare decisis that readers keep bringing up. As I wrote then:Yes, I worry about stare decisis — but it is not an absolute bar to changing precedents. Akhil Amar, the renowned constitutional scholar at Yale, rebuts the same argument. Amar also just appeared on Bari’s podcast, in an episode titled, “The Yale Law Professor Who Is Anti-Roe But Pro-Choice” — a great listen.Bari addressed the Dobbs decision in her new piece, “The Post-Roe Era Begins.” Another reader looks at the legislative route:I think President Biden and the Democrats as a whole would be in a far better position with voters today if over the past 18 months they had taken that same “small bites” approach on a variety of other issues: border security, election reform and just about any other challenge where they now have nothing to show the American voters because they approached those issues if they had significant majorities in each house. They could even take this “small bites” approach right now on the abortion issue, given (as you’ve documented) that the vast majority of Americans favor access to abortions with reasonable restrictions. Instead, Chuck Schumer runs a bill that’s even more permissive than Roe.I know it’s naïve to think we can take politics out of policymaking, but maybe, given the election hand they were dealt, it would have been good politics to pursue progress over progressivism. Right now they’d be running on a far different record (one of being the adults in the room) and could present a much stronger claim for leading our nation. Instead, they wasted a lot of time and opportunity pretending they had the clout to adopt the entire far-left progressive agenda.Another reader delves into the Court precedents that Democrats are wringing their hands over:You wrote about Griswold, Lawrence, and Obergefell: “Thomas also concedes that there could be other constitutional defenses for these previous decisions beyond ‘substantive due process.’”There is one defense, at least. The 14th Amendment has a due process clause and an equal protection clause. When Casey upheld Roe, the right to abortion was based upon due process, not equal protection. Dobbs found that due process did not guarantee the right to abortion. Equal protection of the laws is different. If a state allows an opposite-sex couple to marry or have sex, but bans a similarly situated same-sex couple from doing so, then equal protection of the laws is denied based upon sex, in violation of the 14th Amendment. If there were a state where females were banned from obtaining abortions but males were specifically permitted to have abortions, then that would be a denial of equal protection, based upon sex. But there is, of course, no world in which that would happen, and if there were, the state could simply ban males from having abortions as well and cure the equal-protection problem. Obergefell was based upon both due process and equal protection, so if due process is removed we still have equal protection. Lawrence was decided on due process alone, but it easily could be upheld based upon equal protection. (Justice O’Connor, in concurring in the ruling, said she would have relied upon equal protection instead of due process.) So Lawrence and Obergefell seem safe. Griswold does not seem safe under equal protection, but it may be safe under other provisions, although no state is currently seriously trying to ban the sale of contraceptives. Although Bostock was a decision based upon the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and not on the Constitution, Gorsuch ruled that the law that banned sex discrimination in employment applied to gays and transgender people. His reasoning was that if you fire a female employee for being married to a women but don’t fire a male employee for being married to a woman, then you are discriminating based upon the employee’s sex. There is a very strong argument that the 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause works similarly. I broadly agree with this. Speaking of the transgender debate, a parent writes:While I generally agree with your balanced approach, I think you are still missing what is fueling the alarm on the right. As a parent of a 14 year old, I’m very aware of the extraordinary confusion that some teens now face because of the mainstream promotion of gender identities. For many kids, all this is harmless and ridiculous, and they tune it out. For a very tiny number of kids, this information may be extremely necessary, and perhaps even lifesaving, so they don’t feel so alone.  But unfortunately, I believe there is a quite significant number of kids that have come to believe that all their teen problems will be solved if they simply lop off a few body parts. A few days ago I caught up with a friend who is a wreck because her 14-year-old daughter asked if she could cut off her breasts. This girl has some issues with body anxiety and acceptance, like the majority of teen girls, and has now decided she can avoid all the bad aspects of maturing into a woman by simply becoming a man, which in her mind is closer to remaining a girl, which is what she really wants. The mother is trying to help every way she can, and is about as caring and progressive as a parent can possibly be. But you have to understand how parents today are simply helpless to combat the flood of bizarre, foolish, and/or utterly toxic information that their kids find on the internet, or in social media with their classmates. We entirely ban our 14-year-old from all social media, and from all internet sites except for those needed for school, because we have seen time and time again how kids’ lives are getting wrecked from all that sludge. Most parents are simply not equipped to handle it. Many aren’t able to police their child as thoroughly as we do, and for those on the right with kids, I believe this very real damage has caused some to turn to any platform such as QAnon or other fringe groups that can make sense of this real trauma and harm to their kids. If you don’t have kids, it’s very easy to dismiss this as hysteria. But if you are aware of what's happening to kids nowadays, it’s truly terrifying.Lisa Selin Davis would agree; her new piece on Substack is titled, “It’s a Terrifying Time to Have a Gender-Questioning Kid.” And I completely understand where the reader is coming from. I find the relentless promotion of concepts derived from critical gender and critical queer theory to be destabilizing to kids’ identities, lives and happiness. These woke fanatics are taking the real experience of less than a half percent of the population and imposing it as if it is some kind of choice for everyone else. This is called “inclusion.” It is actually “indoctrination.”Telling an impressionable gay boy he might be a girl throws a wrench into his psychological development, adding confusion, possible generating bodily mutilation. Making all of this as cool as possible — as so many teachers and schools now do — is downright disturbing. The whole idea that all children can choose their pronouns because the tiniest proportion have gender dysphoria is a form of insanity. But it’s an insanity based on critical theory whose goal is the dismantling of all norms, and deconstruction of objective reality by calling it a function of “white supremacy.” This next reader has “a theory I’ve wanted to float by you”:I’m increasingly becoming of the opinion that the modern trans/gender movement is the twisted offspring of something in the gay rights movement that we thought was a good thing but actually wasn’t: the notion that someone is “born that way.” Today, we increasingly feel the need to diagnose children who were “born a certain way” and then provide medical interventions for something that is aggressively conflating the physical and the mental. (I’m using the historical Abrahamic distinction between the two here, sure there’s a philosophical debate about whether or not this distinction exists.) And that makes perfect sense if you think that the foundation of acceptability for these immutable identities is determined at birth — we have medicine in service of zeitgeist.I think the original sin here is going with “what we could get done” in the gay rights movement and stopping before we finished the job — of letting everyone know that these are preferences, and you need to respect and love people regardless of the choices they make and not just because they “can’t help it” because they were “born that way.” If we were to do away with this biological imperative driving identity, we’d end up with what we should really be striving for: radical acceptance of personal choices, and deconstruction of gender roles and stereotypes without engaging in pseudoscience.The trouble with this argument, I think, is that it doesn’t reflect the experience of most gay people. We do not “choose” our orientation. That is the key point — whether that lack of choice is due to biology or early childhood or something else is irrelevant. And genuinely trans people do not choose to be trans either. It’s a profound disjunction between the sex they feel they are and the sex they actually are. It also may be caused by any number of things. But it is involuntary.The queer left rejects this view entirely — because, in their view, there is no underlying reality to human beings, biological or psychological. It’s all about “narratives” driven by “systems of power,” and being gay or trans is infinitely malleable. That’s why they continuously use a slur word for gays — “queer” — to deconstruct homosexuality itself, and turn it merely into one of many ways in which to dismantle liberal society. I regard the “queer left” as dangerous as the far right in its belief that involuntary homosexual orientation doesn’t exist. Lastly, a listener “would like to make a couple of suggestions for Dishcast guests”:1) Razib Khan — he has been blogging for 20 years on genetics, particularly ancient population movements (e.g. Denisovans and Yamnaya). His Unsupervised Learning is currently the second-highest-paid science substack after Scott Alexander. To give you a flavour, his post on the genetic history of Ashkenazi Jews was very popular. Khan also does culture war stuff, mostly because he is a scientist and believes in truth and science. He has subsequently been the subject of controversy, as you can see from his Wikipedia page — which isn’t really fair, but gives you a flavor. His post “Applying IQ to IQ: Selecting for smarts is important” is the kind of thing that gets him in trouble. He is my favourite public intellectual, in large part because he combines actual hardcore science information with anti-woke skepticism. And he is just generally a very smart and interesting guy. Though I’m a fan of his substack, I’d like to hear him on your podcast because I’d like to find out more about Razib as a person, how he feels about the controversies, etc.2) Claire Fox — Baroness Fox of Buckley — is a former communist turned libertarian and Brexiteer, once a member of European Parliament and now a life peer in the House of Lords. Her Twitter feed gives a pretty good idea of her interests and views. Here are some clips on cancel culture in higher education; single-sex spaces for women; and a libertarian view on smoking. She broadly belongs to the British “TERF island” of gender-critical feminists. I know you’ve had Kathleen Stock on your podcast already, but Fox’s background, libertarian views and current membership in the House of Lords make her particularly interesting.I know Razib and deeply admire him and his intellectual courage. And it’s true that, in real life, he’s a hoot, a lively conversationalist, with an amazing life story. Because of his views about the science of genetics and human populations, he is, of course, anathema to the woke left. One good reason to invite him on. Get full access to The Weekly Dish at andrewsullivan.substack.com/subscribe

The Northern Ireland Protocol – agreed between the United Kingdom and the European Union in 2019 – has been a source of tension since it came into force at the start of 2021. The protocol, which creates a special trading arrangement for goods coming in and out of Northern Ireland (the only part of the UK with a land border with the EU), was supposed to protect the integrity of the EU single market, maintain the peace on the island of Ireland and provide Boris Johnson with a way to finally get Brexit done.  But fast-forward to today and the protocol is as contentious as ever. Unionists in Northern Ireland say the protocol is undermining the region's place within the UK. Brexiteers say it is hampering Britain's ability to make trade deals with the rest of the world. And the Government has now proposed a bill to make unilateral changes to the protocol which they say will preserve the Good Friday Agreement, changes which EU leaders say they will resist with legal action.  How do we make sense of this thorny issue? Should the protocol be kept intact to maintain trust between the UK and the EU, or should it be rewritten to preserve the UK's political stability?  Speakers: Jill Rutter - Senior research fellow of UK in a Changing Europe Claire Hanna MP - SDLP Member of Parliament for South Belfast since 2019 Darren McCaffrey - Political Editor and Breakfast Presenter at GB News Moderator: Emma Vardy- BBC Ireland Correspondent covering both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices